236 West 30th Street

USA / New Jersey / West New York / West 30th Street, 236
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167-foot, 14-story Art-Deco office building completed in 1925. Designed by George & Edward Blum, it is clad in buff-colored brick above a 3-story limestone base that includes a black granite water table that is higher at the ends. A large, 2-story opening at the middle of the base has a pair of modernized, mirror-image storefronts at the ground floor, in glass and steel. The storefronts have glass doors at the inner sides, slightly recessed from the show-windows. A stainless-steel pier divides the two storefronts, and a larger horizontal beam tops them. The large space above has glass-and-metal infill, organized into five main bays. At the upper half, the middle and ends bays are subdivided into equal halves by brown metal mullion, while the lower half has each bay divided into two brown metal panels of Renaissance ornament, above pairs of thin round-arches. The end bays of the ground floor have entrances in matching round-arches lined by broad egg-and-dart moldings and wavy ribbons interlacing 5-pointed leaves. The main entrance is in the east side, with steel-framed glass double-doors and a short transom, while the west side has a service entrance with steel double-doors and a low transom. Both transoms are topped by a small colonnade of diminutive Corinthian columns and round-arches, with a fanlight above. The 2nd & 3rd floors have large single-windows at the end bays (subdivided into 3-over-2 panes), while the middle part of the 3rd floor has a band of five windows matching the top part of the infill at the 2nd floor. The base is capped by a stone cornice with a patterned underside.

The upper floors have five bays in the middle, and two end bays, all with the same 3-over-2 windows as seen at the base. The end bays are set apart by wider brick piers, and the brick spandrels between floors in each bay have trios of vertical notches surmounted by zig-zag lines and brown terra-cotta bands adorned with rosettes. Above the 7th floor, the middle bays have small colonnettes in the spandrels, repeated in a series of cascading setbacks at the top floors. The end bays have arched windows at the 8th floor, topped by similar spandrels to those at the middle-bay setbacks. The end bays also have cascading setbacks, beginning above the 8th floor. The piers at the setbacks are capped by stone pyramids capitals, while the smaller brick pilasters between the middle bays have rounded stone finials at each setback.

The side elevations are clad in brown brick, and have mostly bands of four windows, some with triple-windows instead, narrowing at the top floors. The side facades are especially dotted by protruding air-conditioning units.
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Coordinates:   40°44'56"N   73°59'39"W
This article was last modified 5 years ago