Kensington Building (New York City, New York)

 condominium, 1907_construction, Beaux-Arts (architecture)

152-foot, 11-story Beaux-Arts residential building completed in 1907. Designed by Samuel Sass as a store-and-lofts building, it is L-shaped and was an unusually expensive structure when it was built. It replaced the Kensington Hotel, the source of the name of the present building.

The Fifth Avenue facade is organized with a 2-story base, a 3-part, 7-story midsection, and a 2-story top. The painted stone base has modified Doric rusticated piers framing a completely remodeled modern glass storefront. The midsection has a lower transitional story, a 5-story main section, and a 1-story upper transitional story. The smooth stone surface of the lower transitional story has four windows. The main section has a recessed, 3-window central bay treated as a unit capped by a segmental-arch, and rusticated end bays flanking the central bay. The central bay is framed by a concave surface and is capped by a bound laurel molding and a keystone. It has a bracketed balcony at its base (with its balustrade removed), recessed spandrel panels, and a bracketed lintel with pendants and ball finials at the top. The pendants are an assembly of triglyphs, wreaths, ribbons, and other traditional decorative features. The rusticated upper transitional story with five windows is crowned by an entablature with a paneled frieze and bracketed end bays that once doubled as balconies but have lost their balustrades.

The top section has a central, 3-window bay flanked by end bays. The central bay is framed by a compound molding which encloses a pair of fluted Ionic pilasters and slightly recessed spandrel panels. The rusti-cated end bays contain single windows wall on each floor with the upper windows flanked by lion masks with pendants similar to those hanging from the bracketed lintel over the central section of the midsection. The facade is crowned by a pale green Corinthian roof cornice with large dentils and modillions.

The East 15th Street facade is a broader version of the Fifth Avenue facade, seven bays wide. The end bays each contain two 5-story recessed bays with segmental-arches, similar to the 3-window central bay on Fifth Avenue, but here having only two windows and lacking the bracketed balcony with pendants above it. These end bays are terminated in projecting minor cornices and surmounted by a broader version of the upper transitional story on Fifth Avenue. This facade has been modified by the installation of modern metal balconies ranging from two to four windows wide at the 2nd through 7th, 9th, and 10th floors.

It has housed a variety of tenants, including a branch of the American Express Company, Milton Bradley publishers, and several showrooms in the 1910s, and the Seamen's Bank for Savings in the 1940's. New storefront were installed in 1970. Around 1990, it was converted to condominiums.

The ground floor is occupied by Tocqueville restaurant, and Warby Parker eyewear.