The Bryant Park Hotel (New York City, New York)

 hotel, skyscraper, interesting place, Art Deco (architecture)

338-foot, 23-story Art Deco hotel completed in 1924 as an office building. Designed by Raymond Hood and John Mead Howells for the American Radiator Company, it opened as the American Radiator Building, later to be renamed the American Standard Building (due to the name change of the company in 1967), before becoming the Bryant Park Hotel in 2001.

The building blends the 1st & 2nd place designs from the Tribune Tower competition in Chicago: the Gothic detailing of Raymond Hood's winning tower with the Art-Deco streamlining of Eliel Saarinen's runner-up, augmented with a strong use of color. Black brick on the frontage of the building (symbolizing coal) was selected to give an idea of solidity and to give the building a solid mass. Other parts of the facade were covered in gold bricks (symbolizing fire), and the entry was decorated with marble and black mirrors.

At the polished black granite base, the plate glass windows are enframed by slender, bronze, ribbed shafts reminiscent of the Gothic style but terminating in cubistic pinnacles. The windows are surmounted by a slender continuous modillioned bronze enframement. The main entrance, placed between the showroom windows, is set within an arched opening and accented by striking bronze details of modified Gothic design. The pinnacles of the framing above the arch are grouped into the same type of cubistic masses that are so prominent a part of the tower setbacks. The deep reveals of the entrance and the panels above and flanking the arch are of gold-colored stone which provide a striking contrast to the polished black granite stone facing of the lower two floors. The 2nd floor is surmounted by a modillioned cornice set on large intricate corbel blocks, which display a variety of figures reminiscent of medieval prototypes.

The 3rd floor has a distinctive window bay treatment which sets off the tower rising above it. The bays are flanked by indented brick pilasters which are surmounted by gold pinnacles. The design of these pinnacles anticipates the peaks of the setbacks at the upper portions of the tower. Gold spandrel panels above the windows provide further contrast to the black brick. Intricately designed railings, incorporating S-curved snake designs, shield the bases of the 3rd-floor windows.

Although Hood sought to give the main shaft of the tower a massive appearance, it does not have a monolithic quality. Slightly projecting brickwork adds subtle variety to the wall surfaces. The various setbacks of the tower terminate in gold-colored cubistic masses -- forms that are often associated with the Art-Deco style of architecture. Corbels, cornices and spandrel panels, also of gold, accent various window portions of the setbacks. Crowning the tower is a striking arched and pinnacled form that adds the final golden touch to the silhouette of the building.

The Bryant Park Hotel has 130 guest rooms and a theater in the basement. It was also a subject of Georgia O'Keeffe in her noted 1927 painting Radiator Building - Night, New York.

www.bryantparkhotel.com/
daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com/2010/07/breaking-ground-...
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usmodernist.org/TARCH/ARCH-03.pdf