On West 57th St., between 5th and 6th Avcnues, stands this lone Beaux Arts-style mansion. Large vacant lots flank it, awaiting construction, and a graint I-beam structure to its west seems to be holding it up.
In 1891, it was given, fully furnished, as a wedding gift to Maria Louise Vanderbilt, great-granddaughter of "Commodre" Vanderbilt, patriarch of the Vanderbilt dynasty, and William Jay Shieffelin, a descendent of John Jay, the first chief justice, by Maria Louise's mother. At the time, the area was block after block of these brownstone mansions. Several of the Vanderbilts lived in the enclave, including Cornelius Vanderbilt.
They only lived there until 1898. Commercial development began to encroach into the area, and the "hustle and bustle of that area made the residence undesirable," according to Wayne Craven's book, Gilded Mansions. So Maria Louise's mother built and furnished another brownstone for the couple, this one on 66th Street. The 57th Street building was sold to a business man named Samuel Bowne in 1899. By 1910, most of the mansions on the block were demolished, but No. 35 somehow survived and was converted for commercial and business use.
In recent years, the first two floors were occupied by restaurants, Cafe Classico and The Great American Health Bar. In 2021, demolition permits were filed by the ownder, Solow Reality, who tried to push out the commercial tenants. However, the tenants had leases that ran through 2040, and the owner of Solow died in 2020. The company in now owned by his son, but no new permits have been filed. Cafe Classico is gone, but The Great American Health Bar is still there. But it's unclear if it's actually still in business. I've seen workers going into the space, but it didn't look like an active business. It stands there in this weird, kind of surreal limbo. I can't imagine this building remains very much longer.
Sources:
Ephemeral New York: 35 West 57th Street
Dayton in Manhattan 1891 Schieffelin Bowne House
New York Yimby: Demo Permits Filed For 35 West 57th Street in Midtown Manhattan
Patch New York: Old Vanderbilt Mansion Billionaires Row Be Demolished
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