Argosy Book Store

 bookstore, interesting place, movie / film / TV location, commercial building

6-story mercantile building completed in 1945. The facade is clad in light-grey-painted brick. At the ground floor the brick end piers are painted a darker grey with a vertical white stripe. In between is a recessed storefront (protected when closed by a roll-down metal gate). The sides of the recessed area have wood-and-glass display cases, and there are more display cases and bookshelves at the rear wall of the recessed area, with wood-and-glass double-doors at the left.

The upper floors have wide tripartite windows in black metal framing; the end windows also have transom panes. Between each floor are paneled brick spandrels, with slightly-projecting brick borders outlining rectangles of darker-grey-painted brick. A brick parapet caps the roof line.

The building is occupied by Argosy, one of New York's premier antique and rare book dealers. The various sales floors specialize in first editions, Americana, leather bindings, antique maps and prints, and autographs. The store, also noted for a wide selection of bargain books, has its own framing and shipping departments and owns a large warehouse in Brooklyn. The Argosy was founded in 1925 by Louis Cohen, who picked the name, in part, because it started with the letter “A” and would be listed early in telephone directories. It moved to this building in 1964.

In 2024, the site was used as a filming location for an unidentified Netflix production.

www.argosybooks.com/shop/argosy/index.html