Julius Nelson Building

 office building  Add category

190-foot, 18-story office building completed in 1928. Designed by Gronenberg & Leuchtag, it is three bays wide, clad in brown brick above a 3-story white-painted limestone base. At the tall ground floor the piers sit on grey granite bases, and the western bays have storefronts. Above the storefronts are brass-colored metal panels with rosettes and arcades of narrow round-arches with narrow window panes in between. The main entrance is positioned partially below both the middle and east bays of the upper floors, with recessed glass and brass doors, flanking modern light fixtures, and a squared brass canopy. To the right are pairs of metal service doors with the same type of round-arched panel as the western bays.

A modest stone cornice serves as a sill course for the 2nd floor, which has tripartite windows like the 3rd floor. The bays are edged by rope moldings on the piers, and there are ornamented dark-brown iron spandrels between the two floors. At the tops of the piers are simple carved rosettes, and the base is capped by a dentiled stone cornice.

The upper floors have three windows per bay, with brick pilasters separating them. The windows have stone sills and brick headers, and the facade is dotted with protruding air-conditioning units. Within each bay, the 9th floor is topped by a modillioned cornice. At the western two bays the 10th floor has four small round-arched above each window and a cornice with a band of rounded finials marking the first of several setbacks. At the tops of the piers are small, projecting brick arches with stone spheres on top. The eastern bay has 2-story engaged columns with segmental-arches at the 11th floor. The piers extend up to the 12th floor, where they have the same ornament as the western bays and the same cornice begins another series of setbacks. The western side wall facing the narrow alley has double-windows. The ground floor is occupied by ASF Pizza Shop, Robbie & Co. Men's Shop, and Manhattan Apothceary.