The Verdi Apartments

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167-foot, 16-story Renaissance-revival cooperative-apartment building completed in 1925. Designed by Herman M. Sohn, it was originally called the Sherman Square Apartments. The main south and west facades are clad in dark-red brick above a 3-story limestone base and grey granite water table, with glass-and-metal storefronts lining ground floor along the avenue, and a light well above the ground floor splitting the west facade into two wings. There is another light well at the rear, east facade.

The ends of the 2nd & 3rd floors are rusticated, and there is a rounded band course running above the ground floor. The main entrance is at the center of the south facade on 73rd Street, with slightly-recessed glass-and-wood double-doors and a transom below a rounded, green-canvas canopy extending out over the sidewalk. The doorway is framed by a dark-green marble surround, and at the top is a stone lintel with five small rosettes. To the right of the entrance are three single-windows, and two more to the left, with a plate-glass storefront segment at the end. The rusticated end bays both have a single-window; inward from these is a double-window bay on each side, and seven single-window bays in the middle. All of the 2nd-floor windows have black iron grilles over their lower halves, bowing outward, except for the center bay, which a patterned, molded surround flanked by ogees and topped by a small cartouche and triangular pediment. The other 2nd-floor windows also have subtle stone surrounds with scrolled keystones. At the west facade on the avenue, the two wings both have four bays of single-windows. The 2nd floor has bowed iron grilles like those on the south facade, and there is an iron railing with stone posts spanning across the bottom of the light well at this level. 2-story pilasters separate the windows bays at the 2nd-3rd floors, topped by stylized Corinthian capitals above each of which is a small shield interrupting the rope molding and cornice capping the base.

The interior of the light well is clad in brick, even at the 2nd-3rd floors, and has three bays of wide single-windows on its rear wall, and a bay of double-windows and one of single-windows on both side walls. The four windows on each wing have simple stone sills and brick lintels, and low iron railings across the 4th-floor windows. The 13th-15th floors have lighter colored brick and there is a broad stone lintel above the windows of the 13th floor. There are double-height, brick-edged stone piers separating the bays at the 14th-15th floors, with patterned brick spandrels between the two floors, and arches above the 15th-floor windows with the same brickwork, topped by stone eyebrow lintels. A stone cornice marks the roof line at the 15th floor. A 16th-floor penthouse level is setback on both wings, with a central, round-arched single-window in a large stone surround at the rear of the light well. Rising above is a brick-clad mechanical penthouse and water tower housing, clad in brick. Its lower level has three large, round-arched openings on the west facade, and the top part is crowned by a pyramidal roof.

The upper floors of the south facade have the same ornament and design as the west facade, without the light well. The east facade is clad in beige brick, with three bays of single-windows at the south section, which is covered by a beige metal fire escape. The building contains 146 apartments.

The ground floor along the avenue is occupied by Blue Bottle Coffee, Salumeria Rosi restaurant, William Greenberg Desserts, Oxford Cleaners, and Paper House stationery.