Ritz Tower
- Architect
- Emery Roth
- Year
- 1926
- Style
- Beaux-Arts
- City
- Manhattan, NY
The Ritz Tower is a Beaux-Arts luxury apartment hotel at 465 Park Avenue and East 57th Street, built from 1925 to 1926 and designed by Emery Roth and Thomas Hastings for journalist and developer Arthur Brisbane. At about 541 feet and 41 stories, it was the tallest residential building in New York City upon completion, a height reachable because it was classified as an apartment hotel rather than a standard residence.
the building
Ornamented setbacks. The classically-inspired design steps back in numerous setbacks with balustrades and pilastered, pedimented windows, culminating in a pyramidal roof topped with a tall obelisk.
The lower floors. The base is heavily ornamented with sculpted putti and urns set into rusticated limestone blocks, while the interior uses parquet floors and wood-paneled walls reflecting Brisbane's ambition to make it the city's most sought-after apartment hotel.
the style
The Ritz Tower is a Beaux-Arts design, its classical ornament, balustraded setbacks, and obelisk-topped roof marking it as one of Park Avenue's grand apartment hotels of the 1920s.
More on Beaux-Artsthe architect
Emery Roth, a documented significant New York architect, designed the Ritz Tower together with Thomas Hastings.
significance
Designated a New York City Individual Landmark (LP-02118A) on October 29, 2002. None of its original 400 units had individual kitchens, reflecting its origin as an apartment hotel.
nearby
- Hoffman Auto Showroom
- 432 Park Avenue
- Fuller Building
- Central Synagogue
- AT&T Corporate Headquarters Building (later Sony Plaza, now 550 Madison Avenue)
- General Motors Building