24 Union Square East (New York City, New York)

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150-foot, 12-story Beaux-Arts/Second Empire-style office building completed in 1904. Designed by Warren & Wetmore, it consists of a T-shaped tower at the north end, rising above a larger 7-story massing to the south, appearing as separate buildings. The south section has a renovated 2-story commercial base clad in grey stone with a dark grey water table, projecting out from the rest of the building. Its north end is slightly shorter, with a contrasting design to the rest, which is postmodern, with banding, a cornice, and rows of roundels and projecting square ornaments. It has four large bays with plate-glass display windows on both floors, framed at the ends by entrance bays. Both have metal-framed glass double-doors flanked by postmodern rounded pillars with capitals consisting of brass-colored squares enframing white spheres. There is a tall window above the north entrance, and an awning above the southern one, which is wider and extends up higher.

The upper floors of the southern massing have a middle area organized into two halves, each with four bays of windows separated by cast-iron, partially-fluted colonnettes with Corinthian capitals. Pilasters frame both ends, and the division in the center. There is a small setback with a glass railing above the 5th floor, with the top floors faced in grey stone and having eight modern windows. The 7th floor is farther recessed. On either side of this middle section is a flanking wing, similar but not identical in design. The southern one is clad in grey brick, with three bays of double-windows with blue mullions, round-arched at the 4th & 5th floors. The 6th floor is grey stone with three modern windows and a simple roof line. The north wing is just slightly wider, with slender colonnettes between the windows, also arched at the 4th & 5th floors. A cornice runs below the 5th floor, and the 6th floor is similar to that on the south wing, but with a greener shade of stone. There is a mechanical penthouse above with a rooftop water tank.

At the north end is the narrow tower Beaux-Arts portion of the building. It also has a 2-story base that projects out from the tower shaft. While the rest of the facade is limestone and grey cast-iron, the ground floor has been remodeled with steel, glass, and marble piers (with granite bases). The piers frame glass infill with glass double-doors, with a peaked transom, and there are plate-glass windows on either side. An Art-Deco style shallow metal gable tops the entry, highlighted by a green marble circle. The 2nd floor has an arched bay with a tripartite window in a stone molding, flanked by paneled Ionic pilasters and topped by a peaked gable with a dentiled cornice.

The 3rd-8th floors have banded stone end piers, with tripartite oriel windows, the outer panes angled back slightly, all with grey cast-iron pilasters and spandrels. The center spandrel panel curved upward to a cartouche at the base of the 4th & 7th floors. The 8th floor is topped by a modillioned and dentiled stone cornice carried on paired end brackets, with a stone cartouche in the middle. The oriel windows continue on the 9th-10th floors, with paired, engaged stone pillars at the ends. A smaller dentiled cornice sets off the 11th floor, which has a narrower tripartite window framed by flat stone pilasters; a cornice surmounting the window has a small, peaked pediment with a crested shield, and a short mansard roof rising behind it.

The north- and west-facing sidewalls of the tower were once mostly obscured by another building, and are now faced in orange-painted stucco, with only a few windows at the top floors. Two more water towers are visible on the roof.

The main north facade is split into two halves, with the east side set farther back and connected by a narrow, angled bay. The 2-story limestone base is similar to the original base on the west facade, although the ground floor here has been partially altered too, with painted concrete blocks around two freight entrances. Both halves have peaked gables at the 2nd floor, with dentiled cornices running across the entire facade at the tops of both lower floors. The 2nd floor has wide, arched tripartite windows at both sides, and the upper floors have regular triple-windows in black metal framing. The end piers are beige brick, along with the narrow connecting bay, which has a single-window at each floor. The end piers are banded at the 9th-10th floors, and a cornice sets off the 11th floor. The tops of both halves match the top of the west facade, with peaked pediments and mansard roofs.

The base at the shorter section facing the square is occupied by Raymore & Flanigan furniture and mattresses, and Fiftylan bubble tea.