The Bromley Condominiums (New York City, New York) | cinema

 cinema, condominiums

255-foot, 23-story postmodern residential building completed in 1987. Designed by Costas Kondylis of Philip Birnbaum & Associates, it is clad in red brick and grey glass above a 3-story base of limestone, green metal, and glass (on the southern portion) and brown brick and beige stone tiles (on the northern portion). The building is notable for its oculi - circular openings and motifs - on its top five floors and around much of its base above the retail spaces. The building is on the former site of the Loew's 83rd Street theater, designed in 1921 by Thomas W. Lamb, and it now contains the Loew's 84th Street Sixplex, designed by Heid & Rubin in the north part of the base, containing about 2,975 seats. The residential floors rising from the west end of the base present a rhythmic facade with relatively deep recesses providing many corner windows, even in the middle of the building, below the terraced top floors.

The tower is in roughly an L-shape, with the wider end at the south. The residential entrance is located on 83rd Street in the middle of the base's south facade. It has a glass revolving door in the center, with a window and glass door on either side, below transoms, all set in green metal surround and framing. A green metal-and-glass suspended canopy projecting over the entry, with a semi-circular projection at the front that is topped by a glass dome. The lobby windows extend up above the canopy to the 2nd floor, where there is an oculus window and a large round-arch of dark-grey marble wrapping around it. The limestone of the base is lightly rusticated, and the piers have red granite plinths. To the west of the entrance is a narrow bay with green metal infill, and three wide storefronts bays in tripartite configurations; the middle one has a set of green metal service doors, and all three have metal vents included. Green metal spandrels that are narrower than the storefront bays are located above them, and separate the 2nd floor's large, square plate-glass windows that sit above each storefront. Alternating with these square windows are four large oculus windows. To the east of the main entrance is another narrow bay with a secondary entrance of glass-and-metal doors below a metal panel. This is followed by two wide bays, the first infilled with metal panels, glass, and vents, and the second having an entrance to the parking garage. There is a narrow bay of vents at the east end. Like at the west side, the wide bays are topped by metal spandrels and large, square windows at the 2nd floor, alternating with three oculus windows. The 3rd floor has bands of four, five, or six window panes, except for above the storefront bays, where there are double-windows, all still in green metal framing. The base transitions to red brick above the 3rd floor.

The southwest corner is chamfered, with another storefront bay. Continuing north along Broadway there are three more wide storefront bays (and four more oculus windows at the 2nd floor). The design of the base changes at the north half, where the movie theater is located, although the limestone cladding continues along the top and partway around onto the north facade to link to the red-brick tower. The theater's 2-story entrance is framed in brown brick, with the 2nd floor having glass curtain wall sloping back and recessing into the facade, divided into three bays by two black metal piers. The ground floor has four sets of glass-and-metal double-doors at the middle, with another glass door and box office to the left, and two poster boxes on a brown brick wall to the right. A large stainless-steel marquee, triangular in shape and projecting out to a point, cover the entire area. At the north end the base is clad in brown brick and beige stone tile; and the ground level there are poster boxes and brown metal service doors. There are almost no openings at all along the rather depressing north facade of the base on 84th Street. Here the brown brick piers separate bays of beige stone tile, and the ground level is painted dark-brown. There are some brown metal service doors at the far east end, with one more set near the middle below a horizontal vent.

Back on the south facade, to the east of the tower, the base extends up with two floors of red-brick and gray-metal-framed ribbon window like those seen on the tower portion. There are three recessed bays, alternating with non-recessed bays that are topped by stepped parapets, each punctuated with an oculus. Set back behind these are two more floors rising to the roof of the mid-rise section of the building along 83rd Street. Another pair of stepped parapets with oculi cap this roof line.

The west elevation of the tower has three recessed bays, each with two double-windows. The two non-recessed middle bays have bands of seven windows, plus sideways-facing windows at the ends. The south end section has bands of nine windows (and a chamfered corner), and the north end section has bands of twelve windows (and another chamfered corner). Grey concrete floor plates run below each story, and black metal air-conditioning vents are located below the windows. The non-recessed sections set back above the 15th floor, with stepped parapets and oculi at the middle two.

The south facade of the tower has a recessed bay in the middle, with two double-windows. The section to the west has bands of 10 windows, and to the right seven windows, with another short recessed section at the east end with double-windows adjoining a chamfered southeast corner. The non-recessed sections also set back above the 15th floor, with an oculus at the top of each chamfered corner. The north facade has continuous ribbon bands of windows, and a chamfered northeast corner.

There are a series of cascading setbacks every two floors at the top, on the north, west, and south elevations. At each setback, the corners and the corresponding locations of the non-recessed areas on the lower floors are marked by stepped parapets and oculi. The northeast corner of the south wing is also chamfered, and the intersection of the south wing and main span of the tower has a bay of angled, projecting bay windows. The rest of the east elevations follows the pattern of the west facade. A brick-clad water tower enclose, set at an angle, is located at the south end of the roof.

The building contains 304 condominium units. The ground floor along Broadway is occupied by a Spectrum store, Charles Schwab investments, and the AMC 84th Street theater.