Hotel Somerset

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140-foot, 12-story Flemish Revival hotel completed in 1902. Designed by Clarence S. Luce as a residential hotel, the project was taken over from fellow architect Frederick C. Browne. It is clad in dark-red brick with limestone trim above a 2-story rusticated limestone base. There was originally a projecting entrance portico, but this has been removed. Now there are recessed double-doors up a short set of steps and set under a round-arch. A round-arched metal-and-frosted glass suspended canopy extends out, with flat sides panels on either end. There is a small window to the left of the doorway, and a green-and-white-painted wood and glass storefront has been installed on the right. The eastern two bays have round-arched openings, one with a service entrance and the other with a door to the east storefront, up a couple of steps. The area around the entrance is slightly projecting and not rusticated like the rest of the base. At the 2nd floor it has a central round-arched window flanked by two smaller side lights, both of which are framed by small Ionic columns. An additional single-window is located to either side, and a stone panel over the arch reads "SOMERSET" in black metal lettering. The outer bays on the 2nd floor have single-windows with splayed lintels. The base is capped by a band course with a pattern of small arches at the ends, and by a dentiled cornice in the center.

The brick upper floors have stone quoins at the edges, with the shorter segments featuring carved floral patterns. There are seven bays of single-windows. At the 3rd floor they have full, keyed stone surrounds with projecting cornices on small brackets; at the center bay the surround is overlaid by a pair of columns supporting a rounded pediment containing a cartouche flanked by cherubs. The 4th & 5th floor windows have simple stone sills and tall splayed lintels. The 6th-floor windows have flat stone lintels with keystones and paired brackets that carry large projecting sills at the 7th floor, where the windows are framed by Corinthian columns supporting alternating peaked or rounded pediments. The 8th floor returns to the style of splayed lintels and is capped by a carved band course.

At the top was originally a colossal Flemish-style gable, with a central section of four 3-story-high columns ending in a great broken pediment. The columns and upper gable were removed sometime around 1970, and a simpler brick crown designed by architect Garth Hayden. The seven bays at the 9th floor have square-headed windows with thin stone surrounds, and the ends bays are flanked by piers with paneled stone with iron lion's heads at the outer piers. At the 10th floor the end bays have multi-level projecting brick piers with stone caps joined by a cornice, and each window have a stone lintel with a keystone. The five inner bays at the 11th floor match, while the end bays are replaced by scrolls to the matching, projecting piers at the 12th floor' end bays (one bay in from the end bays below). Another set of scrolls frames the three bays of the 12th floor. There is a mansard roof to the outside of the scrolls, with a square dormer on each side. The three bays of the top floor are surmounted by a rounded stone parapet with a stepped-up flat section in the middle, and a single circle as ornament in the enter of the parapet.

The east and west side elevations are clad in brick, with light wells faced in grey stucco. There are two bays of windows north of the light wells, and another to the south. The inner walls of the light courts have two bays of single-windows on the north- and-south-facing sides, and three on the east/west-facing walls.

The building contains 103 guest rooms. The ground floor is occupied by Dunkin'.

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