Spanish Broadcasting Systems (New York City, New York)

 radio station, interesting place, commercial building, Beaux-Arts (architecture)

5-story Neo-French Classic/Beaux-Arts commercial building originally completed in 1871 as a townhouse. Designed by D. & J. Jardine for real estate developer George W. DaCunha, it was sold in at completion, and then again in 1877, 1880, and finally in 1907 to banker Henry Seligman, who had just completed a new mansion for himself two houses away at 30 West 56th. Seligman commissioned architect Harry Allan Jacobs to modernize the structure. Not only did Jacobs bring the interiors up to date—adding new bathrooms and plumbing, stairs and floors—he extended the front and rear and replaced the brownstone façade with gleaming white limestone. After the renovations, Seligman sold the house to banker E. Hayward Ferry and his wife, Amelia Ferry, who lived here for nearly 30 years, despite the fact that by the 1930s most of the mansions of West 56th Street had been converted for commercial purposes or turned into boarding houses.

In 1935, it became the headquarters of the distinguished publishing firm of Albert & Charles Boni. After the Boni firm left the building in 1945, it served various uses. From May 1959 to early 1964, it was the salon, workshop, and home of the noted fashion designer Arnold Scaasi. In 1965, it became the headquarters of the Martin Foundation, a charitable trust established by textile magnate Lester Martin, and was dedicated to Eleanor Roosevelt. In addition to the offices of the Martin Foundation, the building housed the Eleanor Roosevelt Memorial Foundation and Eleanor Roosevelt Memorial Cancer Fund as well as other non-profit cultural organizations such as the newly established American Film Institute. In 1972 the building was conveyed to the Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities. It subsequently served as the offices of an importing firm and in 1988 became the New York City headquarters and studios of the Spanish Broadcasting System.

Spanish Broadcasting System, Inc. (NASDAQ: SBSA) is one of the largest owners and operators of radio stations in the United States. SBS is also invested in television and internet properties, deriving the majority of its income from advertising through its media products. SBS owns the internet portal LaMusica.com. It also acquired WSBS-TV in Miami, Florida and WSJU-TV in San Juan, Puerto Rico, known as MEGA TV.SBS targets the U.S. Hispanic audience in six geographic regions: greater Los Angeles, greater New York, Puerto Rico, greater Chicago, greater Miami, and greater San Francisco.

The facade is divided into a 1-story base, 2-story midsection, and 2-story set-back attic. Above a high granite plinth, the base is clad with rusticated limestone and is divided into three bays with the wide main entry at the center of the façade. The center entry is approached by wide stone step, which in place of conventional railings has original decorative curved wrought-iron scrolled handgrips at either side of the entry. The recessed doorway is topped by concave tympanum enriched with an elegantly carved wreath and swags looped over a central lion’s head. The narrower side bays are set off by splayed lintels and keystones. The western bay contains a paneled stone bulkhead and a window installed after 1940, replacing an original service entrance. The eastern bay remains a service entrance. The center entry retains its original paired wrought-iron-and-glass doors. Flanking the doorway are non-historic torcheres. The base is capped by a stone cyma molding and frieze ornamented with Vitruvian scroll motif and paterae.

The smooth limestone middle section has colossal framing pilasters and features a central 2-story tripartite window set off by a molded surround enriched with a waterleaf-and-dart molding. A stone (now painted) balcony supported by brackets extends along the base of the 3rd-floor windows. This section of the façade is crowned by a full entablature featuring a fillet articulated with a water leaf-and-dart molding, a plain frieze and a denticulated and modillioned cornice.

The 4th & 5th floors are set back to the line of the original rowhouse. The 4th-floor façade is rusticated and has two flat-arched windows with splayed lintels and keystones. The windows are partially screened from view by a stone and terra-cotta balustrade that rests on the 3rd-floor cornice. A molded cornice enriched with a bead and reel motif caps the 4th floor. The party walls framing the mansard roof are faced with limestone. The mansard is covered with standing-seam copper sheathing and has copper-covered dormers with segmental-arched window openings capped by molded segmental cornices.

www.spanishbroadcasting.com/station_directory.html
s-media.nyc.gov/agencies/lpc/lp/2330.pdf