Times Square Housing - Breaking Ground (New York City, New York)

167-foot, 16-story Renaissance-revival residential building completed in 1922 as a 15-story hotel. Designed by Gronenberg & Leuchtag, it opened as the Claman Hotel, named for developer Henry Claman. The hotel was soon acquired by the Manger Brothers, who changed the name to the Times Square Hotel in 1923, with one floor reserved for women. In 1963, Arthur Shwebel (who headed a partnership that ran the hotel from 1962-1981) changed the name of the hotel to the "Times Square Motor Hotel," adding the word "Motor "because there was a need for moderately priced hotel accommodations with free parking." After a period of deterioration, Covenant House acquired the building in 1984 as real estate investment.

The Times Square, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, has received several awards for its innovative programs and historic preservation and design and has been featured in national media including The New York Times, CBS’s 60 Minutes, and National Public Radio.The Times Square combines permanent affordable housing for low-income and formerly homeless adults, persons with serious mental illness and persons living with HIV/AIDS. The building contains 652 apartment units.

The facades are clad in tan brick above a 2-story limestone base with a brown granite water table and terra-cotta trim. The long 43rd Street side is divided into four wings by deep light courts above the base. The eastern wing is four bays wide, while the other three each have three bays, and the connecting sections at the base span one bay each. The main entrance is between the eastern two wings, framed in brown granite, with a deeply-recessed bronze revolving door in a vestibule approached by a short set of black stone steps. A suspended green metal and glass canopy covers the entry vestibule, above which is a round-arched window at the 2nd floor, with a scrolled keystone. The other connecting bays have similar double-height round-arches with keystones, and intricately-carved terra-cotta spandrel panels between the two floors of the base. At the rest of the facade, the piers are rusticated, and the window bays set in stone surrounds. In each of the four wings, the outer bays have double-height window surrounds with carved terra-cotta spandrels dividing the floors; the middle bays have separate upper and lower window surrounds, with small Juliet balconies with green metal railings fronting the windows at the 2nd floor. At the end wings, the ground floor has storefronts, and in the middle wings, there are planter boxes with green metal railings. The base is capped by a limestone cornice, surmounted at each of the light courts by a stone balustrade with heraldic shield.

The upper floors have brick quoins at the corners of each wing; the 3rd floor is transitional, with subtle horizontal banding, and stone surrounds around the windows. The floors above have stone sills and brick lintels on the windows. There are wide stone mullions on the middle-bay windows of the 2nd-from-easternmost wing, and on the western of the middle bays on the 4-bay easternmost wing, dividing these windows into two narrow panes. The 4-bay eastern wing has two columns of small bathroom windows between the inner and outer bays of regular windows, and the other three wings each have one such column.

The recessed rear walls of the light courts have two bays of regular single-windows separated by a bay of small bathroom windows. The rear half of each inward-facing side wall has the same configuration, with no openings on the front half of the side walls. The 12th floor is set off by a string course and topped by a projecting cornice with dentils and large modillions. The 3-story crown is mostly limestone; at the 13th floor, the piers have inset brick panels topped by short, squat, scrolled brackets. The top two floors have double-height openings divided by carved terra-cotta spandrels, the top-floor windows are round-arched with keystones. There are narrow projecting piers between the bays, supporting the crowning stone cornice and sections of balustrade at the roof line.

The west facade on the avenue has six main bays, with the middle one grouped into pairs. The full ground floor is lined with storefronts, and there is more carved terra-cotta on the 2nd floor than on the south facade. At the upper floors, small bathroom windows separate the end bays, and the two pairs of middle bays. At the crown, the narrow projecting piers are only seen around the four middle bays; the end bays are clad in brick and have curved balconies with metal railings at the top floor. The east facade is brick, and mostly windowless, except for a central light well that is lined with metal fire escapes. The north facades is entirely brick, with no windows on the western and 2nd-from-eastern wings. During the Common Ground renovations, catering and dining facilities were constructed on the existing roof, creating a set-back 16th floor. The ground floor is occupied by Green Symphony health food, The Times Eatery, a Starbucks coffee, and Famiglia pizzeria.

Today the Times Square is Common Ground’s flagship supportive housing residence. When Common Ground acquired the building in 1991, the former hotel was crime-ridden and in a state of shocking disrepair. The transformation of the building into the largest permanent supportive housing residence in the nation contributed to the revitalization of the Times Square neighborhood as a whole, and demonstrated a new approach to ending long-term urban homelessness.

breakingground.org/our-housing/the-times-square
archive.org/details/artsdecoration1920newy/page/n12/mod...

 interesting placeapartment buildinghousing services