5th Ave New York

Mary King House // 1901

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A lasting remnant of the grand homes which once dominated 5th Avenue in Manhattan in the Upper East Side, the Mary King House remains an architecturally and historically significant townhome in New York. Mary Augusta King was the granddaughter of late New York Governor John A. King, and widow of Edward King who had died in September 1875 leaving an estate of around $5 million–in the neighborhood of $113 million today. At the tail end of the Gilded Age of old New York, developers hired architectural firm Turner and Killian to design a new home across from the Met Museum at Central Park, away from the large hotels and towers being built in Midtown. Just before the home was completed, it was purchased by Ms. King for her new residence. She resided there a couple years before her death in 1905. The home was sold a couple more times and was eventually acquired by the American Irish Historical Society in 1939. The AIHS was founded in 1897 to ‘inform the world of the achievements of the Irish in America’, and is today a national center of scholarship and culture holding events and allowing researchers.

Flatiron Building // 1902

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The 22-story Flatiron Building in New York is easily one of the most recognizable and iconic buildings in the world. Built in 1902, the building replaced a collection of smaller commercial buildings on one of the most visible lots in this section of the city, thanks to the convergence of 5th Avenue and Broadway at Madison Square Park. The lot was developed by Harry S. Black, President of the Fuller Company, a general contracting company whose specialty was the construction of skyscrapers for their own offices. The company hired Chicago architect Daniel Burnham, who was known throughout the world for his skyscraper designs. Upon completion after just 9 months of construction, the building was called the “Fuller Building”, which was quickly overtaken by the public who named the building the “Flatiron” thanks to its footprint resembling an old flat iron. The building was recently vacant and has been undergoing a complete update inside with sprinkler systems, new floorplans and HVAC.

141-147 5th Avenue // 1896 & 1900

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This stunning Beaux-Arts store and loft structure, is located on a
prominent corner site at 5th Ave and 21st Street in Manhattan. The structure is faced in limestone and terra cotta and was constructed in two phases. The original three southern bays (on the right side of the image) on 5th Avenue were designed by prominent architect Robert Maynicke for real estate developer Henry Corn. In 1899, two years after its completion, architect Henry Edwards Ficken designed an addition to the north wrapping around and running along 21st Street. The addition continued the richly embellished facade and supplemented it with a twelve-story, curved corner bay which is crowned by a dome. The building appears to have been constructed without a major tenant, and many companies utilized the iconic space including: the Merchant Bank of New York, Park & Tilford’s, a fancy grocer, and lace companies. In the mid 20th century the building suffered from deferred maintenance until 2005 when the building was restored and converted to 38 apartments (including one utilizing the dome)!