ALERT: More info about upcoming LPC item, Manhattan House
From Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts
The Landmarks Preservation Commission has just announced that Manhattan House, New
York City’s first white brick apartment building located at 200 East 66th Street, will be calendared at a Public Hearing next Tuesday January 30th. Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts, with the support of elected leaders and other city preservation groups, has long been advocating the LPC to hold a hearing to designate Manhattan House as a New York City landmark.
In 2001/2002, Manhattan House was highlighted in our exhibition “Landmarks of the Future: Modern Architecture on the Upper East Side” and has been the focus of a FRIENDS advocacy campaign since 2000. For more information on our exhibit, visit http://www.friends-ues.org/Moderns.htm.
Manhattan House was completed in 1950 by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and Mayer & Whittlesey. Erected as part of an urban renewal project by the New York Life Insurance Company, Manhattan House is New York’s first “white brick” apartment building, though the brick is in fact a self-cleansing light gray. In this neighborhood formerly defined by tenements, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill provided a precedent-setting, light-filled building. Its innovative H-plan—as opposed to the standard inner courtyard—allows for greater light and cross-ventilation to 95 percent of its apartments. The Bauhaus-style balconies and International Style glass lobby further provide access to light. In 1952, Manhattan House was awarded the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects award for outstanding apartment house.
For more information, contact Seri Worden, FRIENDS Executive Director, 212-535-2526,
[email protected] .