The Argonaut Building (New York City, New York)
| office building, commercial building
USA /
New Jersey /
West New York /
New York City, New York /
West 57th Street, 224
World
/ USA
/ New Jersey
/ West New York
World / United States / New York
office building, commercial building
158-foot,12-story Renaissance-revival office building completed in 1909. Designed by Francis H. Kimball, it was originally known as the Demarest and Peerless Company Building. The building is almost entirely clad on the principal facades in white matte glazed terra-cotta (now painted). The main structure has 9 floors, but there is also a partial 10th floor and a small 2-story tower at the northeast corner.
A. T. Demarest & Co. was a carriage manufacturer that also ventured into the production of automobile bodies around 1902. The Peerless Motor Car Co. of New York was a branch of the Cleveland luxury automobile manufacturing firm. Though architecturally harmonious, the two buildings were constructed separately for these firms - the Peerless building was L-shaped in plan and wrapped around the corner Demarest building - and have subtly different ornamental schemes.
Both structures were acquired in 1918 and combined into one office building by the recently-formed General Motors Corporation for its initial major corporate headquarters. The building was used by General Motors for over 50 years, until its purchase in 1977 by the Hearst Corporation to house offices of its Hearst Magazines division.
The Broadway and 57th Street facades are each articulated horizontally with a 2-story base (originally for showrooms), and vertically with five 3-bay sections that join in a canted 2-bay comer. The building also has a visible, partially articulated eastern facade. At the base the five wide bays of each principal facade are framed with 2-story pilasters capped by shield cartouches. The original arrangement of most of the ground-floor bays was a tripartite storefront window above a bulkhead (several bays had pedestrian or automobile entrances), surmounted by a tripartite transom and terra-cotta spandrel. The ground-floor bulkhead is currently clad with a granite veneer. The current non-historic single-pane storefront windows are surmounted by metal spandrels and commercial
signage.
The easternmost ground-floor section on 57th Street has five metal and glass entrance doors with a 5-pane transom, flanked by bronze plaques with the inscription "Argonaut Building 224 West 57th St". A decorative metal canopy, held by cables anchored to a metal spandrel panel, is located above this. The second section from the east has a vehicle doorway between two metal doors, metal panels and louvers. The comer entrance currently has aluminum-and-glass doors with a transom, two stone steps, railings, and a rolldown gate surmounted by a sign panel and a banner pole. The entrance is flanked by buttressed piers with crouching-figure corbels and lion-with-shield finials. The 2nd-floor windows have a metal mullion and are surmounted by a painted and riveted steel beam.
The upper floors have terra-cotta ornament that includes pilasters, stylized colonnettes, buttresses, round-arches, decorative spandrels, keystones, gargoyles, brackets, dentils, quatrefoil roundels, trefoils, foliation, bosses, corbels, and lion heads. On the 2nd vertical section from the southernmost on the Broadway facade is an oriel on the 5th through 7th floors; the top portion of a cartouche on the balcony parapet bearing the partial letter "P" (for "Peerless") has been removed. The sections of each principal (and southern) facade terminate in pediments flanked by piers (Demarest) or parapets (Peerless).
The exposed portion of the south facade, originally fully articulated and visible above the then adjacent church, is clad in terra-cotta. Today, only the western two bays of windows are visible above the 2nd floor, due to the adjacent apartment building. The westernmost bay originally had slit windows, some of which have been enlarged. The mostly 10-story east facade is clad in tan brick with terra-cotta trim and is embellished in the center with 2-story round-arched window groupings with keyed surrounds with voussoirs and keystones, and spandrel panels. The 2-story tower at the east end of the building, faced in tan brick with terra-cotta trim, is embellished with quoined pilasters; comer shields; corbeling; 2-story bifurcated round-arches on the north and east facades, with keyed surrounds and metal spandrel panels and surmounted by roundels and arches.
The ground floor is occupied by Joe & The Juice, and a TD Bank branch.
hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.c041991257?urlappend=%3Bseq=86%...
A. T. Demarest & Co. was a carriage manufacturer that also ventured into the production of automobile bodies around 1902. The Peerless Motor Car Co. of New York was a branch of the Cleveland luxury automobile manufacturing firm. Though architecturally harmonious, the two buildings were constructed separately for these firms - the Peerless building was L-shaped in plan and wrapped around the corner Demarest building - and have subtly different ornamental schemes.
Both structures were acquired in 1918 and combined into one office building by the recently-formed General Motors Corporation for its initial major corporate headquarters. The building was used by General Motors for over 50 years, until its purchase in 1977 by the Hearst Corporation to house offices of its Hearst Magazines division.
The Broadway and 57th Street facades are each articulated horizontally with a 2-story base (originally for showrooms), and vertically with five 3-bay sections that join in a canted 2-bay comer. The building also has a visible, partially articulated eastern facade. At the base the five wide bays of each principal facade are framed with 2-story pilasters capped by shield cartouches. The original arrangement of most of the ground-floor bays was a tripartite storefront window above a bulkhead (several bays had pedestrian or automobile entrances), surmounted by a tripartite transom and terra-cotta spandrel. The ground-floor bulkhead is currently clad with a granite veneer. The current non-historic single-pane storefront windows are surmounted by metal spandrels and commercial
signage.
The easternmost ground-floor section on 57th Street has five metal and glass entrance doors with a 5-pane transom, flanked by bronze plaques with the inscription "Argonaut Building 224 West 57th St". A decorative metal canopy, held by cables anchored to a metal spandrel panel, is located above this. The second section from the east has a vehicle doorway between two metal doors, metal panels and louvers. The comer entrance currently has aluminum-and-glass doors with a transom, two stone steps, railings, and a rolldown gate surmounted by a sign panel and a banner pole. The entrance is flanked by buttressed piers with crouching-figure corbels and lion-with-shield finials. The 2nd-floor windows have a metal mullion and are surmounted by a painted and riveted steel beam.
The upper floors have terra-cotta ornament that includes pilasters, stylized colonnettes, buttresses, round-arches, decorative spandrels, keystones, gargoyles, brackets, dentils, quatrefoil roundels, trefoils, foliation, bosses, corbels, and lion heads. On the 2nd vertical section from the southernmost on the Broadway facade is an oriel on the 5th through 7th floors; the top portion of a cartouche on the balcony parapet bearing the partial letter "P" (for "Peerless") has been removed. The sections of each principal (and southern) facade terminate in pediments flanked by piers (Demarest) or parapets (Peerless).
The exposed portion of the south facade, originally fully articulated and visible above the then adjacent church, is clad in terra-cotta. Today, only the western two bays of windows are visible above the 2nd floor, due to the adjacent apartment building. The westernmost bay originally had slit windows, some of which have been enlarged. The mostly 10-story east facade is clad in tan brick with terra-cotta trim and is embellished in the center with 2-story round-arched window groupings with keyed surrounds with voussoirs and keystones, and spandrel panels. The 2-story tower at the east end of the building, faced in tan brick with terra-cotta trim, is embellished with quoined pilasters; comer shields; corbeling; 2-story bifurcated round-arches on the north and east facades, with keyed surrounds and metal spandrel panels and surmounted by roundels and arches.
The ground floor is occupied by Joe & The Juice, and a TD Bank branch.
hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.c041991257?urlappend=%3Bseq=86%...
Nearby cities:
Coordinates: 40°45'57"N 73°58'53"W
- Fisk Building 0.2 km
- 3 Columbus Circle 0.2 km
- 250 West 55th Street 0.2 km
- Time Warner Center 0.4 km
- 515 West 57th Street 0.8 km
- Open Road Volkswagen / Audi Manhattan 1 km
- Manhattan Motorcars 1.2 km
- 629 West 54th Street 1.2 km
- Verizon Garage 1.3 km
- New York State Route 9A - Joe DiMaggio (West Side) Highway, 620 1.4 km
- 59th Street – Columbus Circle Subway Station (1,2,A,B,C,D) 0.2 km
- Hearst Tower 0.2 km
- Columbus Circle 0.3 km
- Deutsche Bank Center 0.3 km
- NYCTA Rail Control Center 0.4 km
- Theatre District 0.8 km
- Midtown (North Central) 0.9 km
- Hell's Kitchen (Clinton) 1.1 km
- Manhattan 1.9 km
- Upper West Side 2.4 km
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