The Presidential (New York City, New York)

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244-foot, 23-story postmodern residential building completed in 2003. Designed by Schuman Lichtenstein Claman & Efron and Robert Kane, it consists of a main tower on 42nd Street, a 10-story mid-rise on 43rd Street, and a 4-story wing extending over to Ninth Avenue. A landscaped courtyard separates the two main buildings, which are connected by a glassed-in walkway. The main entrance is in the 10-story north wing, which is clad in beige brick with a low, grey granite water table. The facade is eight bays wide, with the entrance in the westernmost two bays, and an entrance/exit to the underground parking garage in the easternmost two bays, with a small storefront directly to the right of the garage. The main entrance has a marquee suspended on cables from the 4th floor.

The upper floors have exposed floorplates, and double bands of red brick across the piers at the base of the windows. The facade is symmetrical, with the exception of an additional bay of double-windows at the west end. The center bay has 4-paned windows, flanked by two bays of triple-windows, and end bays of double-windows. Every bay has black metal air-conditioning vents below the windows. The window units all have grey metal framing, except for the 4th-9th floors of the triple-windows bay, which are painted red, and have red metal spandrels. Above the 7th floor, the center and end bays set back; above the triple-window bays have angled sides, with narrow window panes. The full 10th floor is set further back.

The 4-story wing extending to the west to the avenue is scaled to match to existing 4-story, 19th-century buildings to its south. It is faced in red brick, with the grey granite water table from the 10-story section continuing along the base. Its north facade has ten bays on the upper floors (from left to right: a single-window (on the top floor only), a bay of single-windows, two bays of double-windows, a bay of single-windows, a bay of double-windows, two bays of single-windows, a tripartite window bay, and a last double-window bay. The windows all have beige stone sills and lintels. The ground floor has a small, metal service door at the east end, and four grey metal-and-glass storefronts to the west. The west facade on the avenue is three bays wide, with single-windows, and a storefront on the ground floor. Both facades are topped by a bracketed grey metal roof cornice. The ground floor of the 10-story building is occupied by Oxford Cleaners, and the 4-story wing by Red Poke restaurant.

The tower on 42nd Street is clad in beige brick, set back above a 4-story base of red brick. The base is designed to match the 4-story wing on 43rd Street, but with larger plate-glass storefronts on the ground floor. On its west facade, it spans eight bays; the five north bays have triple-windows, and the three south bays have double-windows. On the south facade on 42nd Street the base spans eight bays of triple-windows, with a 1-story, 2-bay section at the east end with metal vents; the tower's facade is set back above these bays, with the rest set back above the top of the base at the 5th floor.

The south facade of the tower has six bays, the easternmost recessed. From west to east there are tripartite windows, double-windows, tripartite windows, two bays of double-windows, and tripartite windows in the recessed bay. All the bays have black metal vents below them, and grey metal framing, except for the two non-recessed tripartite windows bays, which are painted red beginning at the 10th floor, and also have red metal spandrels. The facade is also banded with exposed floorplates.

The west edge of the south facade has a single pane of windows wrapping around the the west facade where there are three more panes at the end bays. The middle section of the west facade projects forward, with a gently curved metal and glass curtain wall, accentuated by a deep red color on window mullions and floor slab covers, bisected by a beige brick pier in the center that ends at the 21st floor. At the top floor, the roof line along the curved section is marked by red metal fins that project up slightly. The north facade of the tower has a bay of single-windows at the west, followed by a bay of double-windows, two bays of tripartite windows, another bay of double-windows, and a recessed end bay of tripartite windows. The recessed bay and the eastern of the middle tripartite bays have red metal from the 10th floor up. There are no vents below the single-windows.

The complex contains 256 apartment units. The ground floor of the tower's base is occupied by Benjamin Moore paint and hardware, and a TD Bank branch.