Riverside – West End Historic District

Once called the “Acropolis of the world's second city,” this scenic district offers outstanding views of the Hudson River and Riverside Park. Consisting of 265 buildings of varying types and architectural styles, the district is representative of the various stages of development in the Upper West Side, west of Broadway, from 1884-1939. The early Upper West Side real estate boom, starting in the 1880s, is recalled by the remaining harmonious groups of Renaissance Revival, Georgian Revival, and Beaux-Arts row houses, many built by Clarence F. True, C.P.H. Gilbert and Alexander Welch.

The district also includes many pre- and post-World War I apartment buildings. These early six- and seven-story elevator flats, related in materials, style, and ornament to the row houses, reflect the growing acceptance of luxury apartment living for prosperous residents. Postwar construction lined the avenues with fifteen-story apartment houses offering smaller, less expensive flats. Their modesty is reflected in the restrained façade treatments, with ornamental programs inspired by the Beaux-Arts, Gothic, Renaissance, and Romanesque styles generally restricted to the base and the upper levels. Only a few buildings in the district were constructed after the Depression, among them Emery Roth's 1939 Normandy, a notable combination of Italian Renaissance and Art Moderne.

The 2012 extension added 194 residential, institutional and commercial buildings of historic and architectural significance to the district. Other notable buildings include R.H. Robertson's Romanesque /Renaissance Revival style St. Paul Methodist Episcopal Church on West 86th Street (now St. Paul & St. Andrew, an individual landmark, 1895-97); the Isaac L. Rice Mansion at 89th Street and Riverside Drive, built by Herts and Tallant (now the Chofetz Chaim Yeshiva, 1901-03); the Congregation B'nai Jeshurun Synagogue by Schneider and Herts (1917-18); and the Greek Orthodox Church of the Annunciation (formerly the Fourth Presbyterian Church) located at West End Avenue and 91st Street. This building was designed by Heins and La Farge, and completed in 1893-1894.

The second, pending, extension of the Riverside-West End Historic District—five separate sections stretching from West 89th to West 109th Street along Broadway, West End Avenue and Riverside Drive-- provides a snapshot of residential construction for the last two centuries. It encompasses approximately 338 buildings, ranging from the early row-houses of the 1880s to the turn of the century, up to a small group of apartment buildings constructed in the late 1930s and 1940s.

When, in 1904, the Broadway subway line opened and land values soared, row house development became uneconomical. As apartment living grew more popular among Manhattan's moneyed residents, and with the expiration of many of the original 20- or 30-year covenants restricting development to single-family buildings, large elevator apartment buildings up to twelve stories high, were built along West End Avenue, rapidly altering the neighborhood; an unusual occurrence in New York City. The massing, form, and fireproof materials of these new elevator apartment buildings, many in light colored brick with stone base and classical ornament, were affected by the 1901 Tenement House Act. Most of them were constructed to the maximum allowable height, right up to the property line, with side courtyards; these footprints allowed for luxuriously spacious seven to 14-room apartments, replete with modern amenities and even servants' quarters.

After World War I, high-rise apartment buildings up to 22 stories in height began to line West End Avenue. Designed by renowned architects such as Rosario Candela, Jacob M. Felson, Lucian Pisciatta, Arthur Lobo, Sugarman, Hess & Berger, and Emery Roth, these new buildings conformed to the new 1916 zoning law, which enabled greater height, with the use of setbacks. Developed for the middle-class, these later apartments were smaller in size than their pre-war precursors, with no servants quarters. Only a few residential and institutional buildings represent the late 1930s to early 1950s; these later apartment buildings, designed by architects Sylvan Bien, Herbert Lilien, and Irving Brodsky, are modest in their size and restrained use of ornament. ©2014