James J. Goodwin Residence

 office building, townhouse

5-story Neo-Georgian commercial building completed in 1898 as a mansion and adjoining guest house. Designed by McKim, Mead & White for James J. Goodwin (a cousin of J.P. Morgan), the two separate residences were deftly designed to appear as a single unit. By positioning the portico to the far right of No. 11 and downplaying the entrance of No. 9, the doorway of No. 11 became centered within the mass of the structures. The block filled with financiers and physicians and in 1915 the Goodwins were leasing No. 9 to Dr. William S. Bryant.

Goodwin died in 1915 at the age of 80, but his widow, Josephine Goodwin, continued to reside in the house. By 1928 she was leasing No. 9 to wealthy real estate developer Francis de Ruyter Wissman and his wife. Josephine died in 1931, and in 1940 the mansion become the Inter-America House, a trade center. The house was used for a variety of events intended to foster good will between the United States and South American countries.

In 1943 No. 9 was owned by the Museum of the Modern Art, called the “Annex.” It was converted that year to the museum’s new photography center. From 1945 until 1979, the building housed the Rhodes Preparatory School, whose alumni include Robert deNiro, James Caan, Commerce Secretary Ron Brown and fugitive Marc Rich. It was then purchased and used as an office of the U.S. Trust Company until 2009, when the property was purchased by J. D. Carlisle Development for $29 million.

The design for the double house at 9-11 West 54th Street derives from Charles Bulfinch's third Harrison Gray Otis house, built on Beacon Street in Boston in 1806. While the proportions of the Goodwin residence have a more vertical emphasis, the facade design is very similar to that of the Bulfinch-designed house.

The 5-bay facade of red brick above a rusticated limestone base is distinguished by an ordered facade that projects slightly from the building plane and by fine stone detailing. Although the building housed two dwelling units--a larger 3-bay unit at No. 11 and a smaller 2-bay section at No. 9 -'-the facade was designed as a symmetrical whole, fronted by a wrought-iron fence.

The entrance to No. 11, set at the center of the stone base, is marked by a portico composed of fluted Ionic columns with Scamozzi capitals and a carved panel with a small cartouche, while the more simply treated entrance to No. 9, with Ionic pilasters and a modillioned entablature and a similar carved panel, is located on the far right of the front wall. Three crisply recessed windows crowned by paneled keystones complete the composition of the ground floor, which is separated from the upper floors by a band course carved with a fret pattern. Above, elongated double-hung windows light the 2nd, principal floor. These windows have striking stone enframements with foliate brackets and paneled entablatures. Each window is fronted by a low iron balcony. A large balcony over the entrance portico marks the center window and a second balcony appears directly above. The 3rd and 4th floors, which diminish in height and are separated by a molded stone string course, are lit by double-hung windows crowned by splayed stone lintels with paneled keystones. The building is crowned by a modillioned cornice and a stone balustrade that serves as a balcony for the five dormers that pierce the copper-clad mansard at attic level.

digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/e90631b0-5102-0134-9f...
dlc.library.columbia.edu/mmw_photographs/10.7916/d8-6p4...
backlot.smugmug.com/Midtown-Manhattan-14th-St-to-59th-S...