My favorites Building in New York is the old Dakota from 1884.
and two old pics
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Allied Chemical Building shortly after opening, showing the brutalist tower section
The glassier neon side of the Allied Chemical Building
Dusk falls on the city c. 1960s
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The bad taste in the 60s-80s transcends buildings - Cars, interior design, clothes, popular decor colors, many hair styles, appliances, even the logos of sports teams - lots of ugliness abounds!
I do like some high rises from that era - For example, I think the sloping facades of the WR Grace and Solow buildings are quite cool - I feel that those large international/“modern” monster buildings can be tolerable in the appropriate context - For instance, the XYZ buildings align with the grid and are smack in the middle of a high rise forest whereas those hulking masses along the southern rim of Manhattan (55 Water, 1 NY Plaza, 4 NY Plaza, etc) are like an ugly 650 foot security wall rising from the water that completely blocks the view of the more varied and slender downtown towers. They don’t cascade or have any complimenting effect or respectful massing; they are just ugly behemoths that mar the skyline. I get the economic sense to build big rectangle boxes, but have a little consideration for the greater area if you’re going to build something that’s gigantic and will last 500 years.
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1984: Crossroads Building before demolition
I wondered what seemed odd about this: the upper shaft has almost no windows: it is a painted on mural of the former Times Building across the street
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Hotel Astor
Times Square with old Hotel Astor 1951
Times Building 1951
Times Square 1955
1958
Times Square 1967
Park Row & Worth Street 1953 in the background is the World Building
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The most interesting photograph I found was this one of this building on the southwest corner of Mercer St. and Bleeker St. Apparently, from the old maps, these blocks were full of those small buildings.
1909
199-201 Wooster St. (ca. 1920)
Shantytown near West Houston and Mercer streets (1935)
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Also I just found something about the Public School 125 we could see on the map, but unfortunately I didn’t find pictures of the building.
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Thanks guys!
Looks like Nothing spectacular was there but what’s there right now is awful. Block upon block of the surrounding area is world-class beauty.
Yet these couple blocks are a complete disaster. I will never understand why people even made the effort to build such garbage.
These two towers are also my least favorite in the entire city. They are Completely soulless in a sea of surrounding beauty.
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That is disgusting
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I think balconies should be illegal.
They make every ugly building 10xs worse.
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At least Zeckendorf’s sons have raised the standards of the family firm after that 90s junk by Union Square.
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April 1960 aerial view of financial District
Barclay Street 1979
March 1967
Hall of Records
aerial view 1951
Woolworth Building under construction 1913
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@Ihateussteel What’s this building from the first pic?
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That would be the tower part of 60 Wall Street. It was built in 1905 and later had a skybridge connecting it to 70 Pine Street. By the time the 70s came around, Cities Service was prepared to move across the country and decided to demolish 54 Wall, 58 Wall, 60 Wall, 64 Wall and a few other tenements to avoid paying property taxes and to make the land more desirable. From 1975 to 1986 it was an empty lot.
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What is the name and style of those decorative pediments? Of course they went from that to the current hideous caricature we know as 60 Wall Street.
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