Barkin Building

 office building, commercial building

177-foot, 17-story office building completed in 1926. Designed by George and Edward Blum, it is clad in buff-colored brick above a 2-story limestone base. There are entrance at both ends, both recessed and set under matching round-arches with inner egg-and-dart moldings and outer moldings with flower and vine patterns. Both have black metal screens filling the tops of the arches, above stone panels with a row of five paired vertical notches, each pair topped by a round-arch. The east end has the main entrance, with brass-and-glass double-doors, while the west end has a service entrance with metal double-doors. Both of the ends bays have grey granite bases. The center section has a modern, 2-story curtain wall of steel and glass with two slightly-recessed storefront entrances at the ground floor, and a row of metal vents and pale-green glass spandrels separating the 2nd floor. The end bays at the 2nd floor have single-windows without ornament. The base is capped by a stone band course above a patterned frieze.

The upper floors have four bays of four windows each, with stone sills and brick lintels. The brick spandrel panels have checkerboard patterns. The middle two bays have a shallow setback above the 7th floor, and there is a full-width setback above the 8th floor, marked by stylized capitals at the main piers and small finials at the intermediate piers between windows, as well as the tops of the spandrels having decorative recessed geometric shapes.

At the next two floors, the middle section is recessed further, creating two end pavilions, each with two windows facing north, and angles sides (on both sides) with single-windows at a diagonal. This pattern repeats at setbacks above the 10th & 12th floors. At the 14th floor, only the end bays set back (ending the pavilions), while the middle section drops off the outer two windows on each side, continuing above as angled side walls, each with a single-window. The middle section then sets back above the 16th floor, with eight narrower windows at the top floor, flanked by short angled walls (both with a single-window) projecting forward to meet the end bays, which each have three windows on the 15th-17th floors, although some of the openings have been filled in.

The rear, south-facing facade, also clad in brick, has shallow full-floor setbacks above the 8th, 10th, 12th & 14th floors, with four wide bays of windows. The east elevation is clad in tan brick at the front with two bays of triple-windows (dropping off at the setbacks), and in brown brick at the middle and rear, with a more reddish brick at the top three floors. There are two bays of single-windows toward the rear, with the south one ending at the last rear setback.

The ground floor is occupied by Tsuru TonTan Udon Noodle restaurant, and The Elgin restaurant.