Timothy Oulton Store (New York City, New York)

 Second Empire (architecture), historical building, commercial building

5-story cast-iron Second Empire-style building completed in 1869. Designed by James H. Giles as a department store for Lord & Taylor, the building at 901 Broadway features a bold cast-iron facade together with a prominent mansard roof and striking corner tower. Despite the tremendous size of the cast-iron store, the firm nonetheless outgrew its new building. Shortly after 1870, an addition was erected at 10 East 20th Street.

The firm continued to expand over the years, eventually occupying most of the buildings on the block bounded by Broadway, Fifth Avenue, and East 19th and 20th streets. Lord & Taylor moved uptown to Fifth Avenue between 38th and 39th Streets in 1914. By 1919, the 901 Broadway was used for offices and light manufacturing. It was given landmark status in 1977, but nevertheless languished for many years. When it was sold in 1995, it was occupied only by a nightclub on the ground floor. New owner Darius Sakhaio replaced the storefront and restored the building's upper facade.

The building is dominated by its diagonal corner tower with mansard roof. The tower is flanked by a single bay facing Broadway and by the long East 20th Street facade. Above the ground-floor storefront of metal and glass, installed in the late 1980s, the facade is intact. The corner tower is set above the ground floor on an oblique angle and rises a full story above the mansard roof. Pilasters with modified Corinthian capitals flank each story of the tower. At the tower, the triple window bays of the three central stories are composed of a wide central window flanked by narrow side windows opening onto variously shaped balconies with low railings of delicate ironwork. The window enframements have stilted flat arches with curved ends supported on slender engaged Corinthian columns. At the upper floors of the tower, the windows are set in a flush wall. At the 4th floor, the lintels above the windows consist of flat arches with corbel-form ends, while the inner flat arches of the enframements have deep curvilinear stilts. A cornice with closely spaced brackets extends around the entire facade above the 4th story and is surmounted, at the tower, by a full attic story with five tall, narrow windows. At either side of these windows, diminutive engaged columns support stilted elliptical arches, ornamented with delicate curvilinear forms at the spandrels. The deeply recessed tympanums of these arches also display delicate decorative motifs. Above a cornice with closely spaced diminutive brackets, a tall mansard roof of slate in a fish-scale pattern terminates the tower and is crowned by an elaborate iron cresting.

The East 20th Street facade is composed of a long center section with window bays at either end flanked by pilasters. The design of the windows is similar to that of the tower at the 3rd floor. Curvilinear ornament at the spandrels of the lintels is further enhanced by the low railings with small narrow arches beneath these windows. A curved balcony, from which the railing has been removed, serves the central windows of the 3rd floor. The bracketed roof cornice above the 4th floor of the store projects slightly above the central section of the facade. The ends of the mansard roof above this central section are set off by paneled uprights topped by finials. This roof has three flat-arched dormer windows with arched pediments and is crowned by an ornate iron cresting.

The building sold again in 2006 and 2009, with the a gallery occupying three floors, and the trendy women’s clothing retailer Miss Sixty renting the ground floor. Brooks Brothers opened a store on the ground floor in 2011 which closed in 2021. It is now occupied by Timothy Oulton.

daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com/2010/04/surviving-sliver...
www.urbanarchive.org/sites/RYhfbmH8J1f
www.nytimes.com/2018/03/04/nyregion/in-health-care-for-...