Greenwich Savings Bank Building (New York City, New York)

 bank, Art Deco (architecture), historical layer / disappeared object, 1950s construction

1-story HSBC Bank building originally completed in 1953 as a Greenwich Savings Bank at 101 W. 14th Street. Designed by Halsey, McCormack & Helmer in a late Art-Deco style, it is clad in limestone and has a chamfered corner where the main entrance is located.The one-story granite and limestone bank sits prominently on the northwest corner of Sixth Avenue and 14th Street, and the chamfered-corner form of its tripartite façade clearly addresses the busy intersection. The focal point of the building's monumental, geometric composition is a clock embedded above the main entry doors on the middle façade.

The building interior featured a 1954 mural by Julien Binford, "A Memory of 14th Street and Sixth Avenue", that could be seen from the street. The HSBC branch closed in 2016 and the interior was gutted except for the mural by Binford which remained until it was removed in 2017 by Save Chelsea with the aid of Andrew Cronson. In March of 2018, Banksy returned to New York where he unexpectedly painted a rat running in the building's clock face.

The building was demolished in spring 2019 to be replaced by an ODA-designed residential building.

See also:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julien_Binford
midcenturymundane.wordpress.com/2013/02/18/greenwich-sa...
www.nytimes.com/2017/11/22/arts/chelsea-mural-demolitio...
www.thevillager.com/2017/11/as-demolition-looms-a-race-...
www.wnyc.org/story/hickory-dickory-dock-banksy-ran-cloc...


www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WpE8xKJinw&ab_channel=PIX11New...