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173 West 78th Street (New York City, New York)

USA / New Jersey / West New York / New York City, New York / West 78th Street, 173
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180-foot, 16-story Renaissnace-revival residential building completed in 1929. Designed by George A. Bagge & Sons, it is clad in reddish-brown brick above a beige-painted limestone ground floor that is lined with metal-and-glass storefronts along the avenue. The same architects designed the very similar building immediately to the north, which began construction a year after the completion of this one.

The residential entrance is near the east end of the south facade on 78th Street. It has glass double-doors atop a dark-grey granite step, covered by a rounded, navy-blue canvas canopy extending out over the sidewalk. The doors are set in a surround with a top panel featuring an urn flanked by rosettes. This is surmounted by four small brackets and two elongated end brackets carrying a small cornice. There is a narrow vent to the left of the entry and a double-window to the right, with a grey metal mullion. The end piers at the ground floor are lightly banded, and near the west end there is a storefront window. The storefronts along the avenue are organized into seven bays, the wider ones being the 2nd & 3rd from the north, and the southernmost bay. There is a glass door in the northernmost and 3rd bay from the north, and recessed double-doors with angled sidelights in the 2nd bay from the south.

The upper floors on the wide west facade have a center bay of paired windows, flanked by a single-window on either side, and then a bay of double-windows, a bay of paired windows (on the north; the south has single-windows), and end bays with double-windows. A dentiled band course runs across the top of the 3rd floor, and there are 2-story fluted stone pilasters at the 2nd-3rd floors, with stylized capitals, flanking the four double-window bays. The 2nd floor has splayed stone lintels above the center paired windows, and stone surrounds at the double-window bays, with keystones, end brackets, and cornices. There are also stone surrounds at the 4th floor double-windows, without the ornament on top. The facade is dotted with protruding air-conditioning units. A thin string course sets off the 13th floor, where the double-window bays have stone surrounds with fluted sides, balusters between brackets at the bases, and bracketed cornices on top. The center bay has splayed lintels at this floor. A projecting band course caps the 14th floor, and there are simple stone surrounds with keystones at the double-window bays on the 15th floor, along with banded stone end piers. The lower roof line is at the 15th floor, with a set-back penthouse floor above it.

The upper floors on the south facade have end bays with double-windows, and three bays of paired windows in the middle. The stone ornament at the double-windows matches that on the west facade. The east elevation, facing a narrow alleyway, is clad in the same brick on the south part and beige brick on the north part, which is set slightly back. The south part has a single-window paired with a smaller window, a bay of wide single-windows, and a double-window bay. The north part has two bays of single-windows and two bays of double-windows, and the short, north-facing connecting wall has single-windows paired with smaller windows. A large steel pipe runs up the facade near the north end. At the northeast corner of the roof is a mechanical penthouse and water tower enclosure, clad in red brick, with three round-arched openings on each side.

The building contains 84 apartment units. The ground floor is occupied by Tacombi restaurant.
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Coordinates:   40°46'57"N   73°58'42"W
This article was last modified 1 year ago