The Cell Theater Company | theatre, interesting place, historical building

 theatre, interesting place, historical building

3-story theater building originally completed as a row house in 1819 for John S. Boyd and family. By 1893 the Boyds had moved out and the new owners decided to rent rooms. In 1919 the house was sold, and then resold to the New York Savings Bank (formerly the Rose Hill Savings Bank), who began the process of renovating the old high-stoop house to a modern bank to a design by Halsey, McCormack & Helmer.

The basement and first floor were transformed into a single, soaring space accessed through bronze doors within a 2-story arched opening. At the right side a doorway provided access to the apartments upstairs. It was echoed in the window on the opposite side and both mimicked the treatment of the upper floor openings. While the residential character of the 3rd and 4th floors—including the bracketed cornice—remained intact; the new stone front presented the clean, modern visage of a stable financial institution.

The upper floors were leased to residential tenants. When the bank was taken over by the Century Bank in 1928, it signaled a series of rapid-fire changes. Later that year Century Bank merged with the Dewey State Bank, while retaining its old name. By 1930 it was a branch of the Interstate Trust Company while, again, still maintaining the Century Bank name.

In 1941, the former bank space was taken over by the Molloy Funeral Home; then by the Horne-Dannecker Funeral Home in 1957. The central entrance was removed, with the double-height arch now filed by window panes in a metal grid; the scrolled keystones on top remains. The end bays were given wood-and-glass doors, set in stone surrounds with thin cornices. Eventually Horne-Dannecker moved north to the Bronx and the eclectic life of No. 338 continued as the PWG Gallery moved in by 1998. It was followed by the John Stevenson Gallery which remained here until about 2006; replaced by the Cell Theater Company. Still in the space today, The Cell is a not-for-profit arts collective.

There is a small window to either side of the upper part of the arch, and the stone base is capped by a cornice. The red-brick upper floors have three bays of single-windows in limestone surrounds topped by small cornices. The facade is crowned by a white metal roof cornice with acanthus-leaf brackets and panels.