200 East 57th Street (New York City, New York)

USA / New Jersey / West New York / New York City, New York / East 57th Street, 200
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210-foot, 19-story modernist cooperative-apartment building completed in 1961. Designed by Hyman Isaac Feldman, it is clad in white brick. The ground floor is lined with modern glass-and-metal storefronts along the avenue; the south part of the building has an extra floor inserted between the ground-floor space and the upper floors due to the slope of the site. This extra floors has a band of windows wrapping around to the south facade, with a grey metal band below it and a black stone band across the top. There are some vents and a service entrance at the ground floor on the south facade on 56th Street. At the east end the window band of the extra floor ends, and the building is set back above the ground floor, where there are more plate-glass storefronts. A white metal railing caps the ground floor here, extending all the way over to run above an entrance to the underground parking garage at the far east end. The main entrance is at the east end of the north facade on 57th Street. It has a recessed glass door up a couple of stone steps, behind two white marble piers, and is covered by a rounded green canvas canopy extending out over the sidewalk. To the right is a white marble wall with a black stone band across the top (that also extends over the entrance), with the number "200" in brass affixed to the center of the wall. The west half of the ground floor here has a continuation of the storefront from the avenue side. At the far east end there is a gate and passage leading back into a courtyard.

The upper floors on the west facade have three bays of tripartite windows at the north and south ends, with the middle section set back above the ground-floor. The center of the middle section has a bay of double-windows flanked by tripartite windows, and the next two bays on either side have tripartite windows set slightly farther back. The sidewalls created by the set-back middle section have a bay of tripartite windows and a single-window at the rear. All the windows have white metal mullions and small, slit air-conditioning vents below them, except for the double-windows, and the windows on the sidewalls.

The north facade on 57th has eight bays at the left (three tripartite windows and a double-window, followed by three more tripartite windows and a narrower double-window), and separated off to the right is a bay of single-windows and a final bay of tripartite windows. The south facade on 56th has seven bays on its west section (all tripartite windows, except for a double-window in the 2nd bay from the west). The recessed east section has a bay of narrow double-windows hugging the sidewall, followed by a bay of tripartite windows, two bays of small bathroom windows, a single-window, and an end bay of tripartite windows.

The two wings created by the recessed middle section on the west facade begin a series of setbacks above the 13th floor, where the ends of the wings set back; the three window bays set back above the 15th floor, and again above the 17th & 18th floors, where there are angled side walls with corner windows. Similarly, the east end bay and the three west bays on the north facade set back above the 13th floor, with all but the middle bays setting back above the 15th floor, and a full setback above the 17th & 18th floors, with angled side walls around the middle bays. The west section of the south facade matches the setbacks. At the double-window bay 2nd from the west, the openings change to paired windows at the 12th & 13th floors. The shorter east section terminates at the 10th floor at its three eastern bays, and at the 11th floor at the others.

The building contains 198 apartments. The ground floor is mostly occupied by a large Duane-Reade pharmacy, but also on 56th Street by Shyam Ahuja carpets, with the extra floor at the south end occupied by Inform Fitness and All Seasons Nail & Spa.
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Coordinates:   40°45'35"N   73°58'2"W
This article was last modified 4 years ago