45 West 11th Street: Review and Ratings

Review of 45 West 11th Street by Carter Horsley

Several blocks, including this one, just to the west off Lower Fifth are considered among the most beautiful and desirable in the city.

They have an eclectic and charming mix of handsome townhouses, some early apartment buildings and an elegance not rivaled elsewhere downtown and only on a few blocks uptown.

West 11th Street is anchored by the very dignified and nobly fenced garden of the First Presbyterian Church, designed by Joseph C. Wells in 1846, at Fifth Avenue on the north side and the very grand pre-war apartment house on the south Side at 40 Fifth Avenue. One of the former Greek Revival townhouses at 18 West 11 Street exploded in 1970 when a radical group's bomb factory malfunctioned. A landmarks controversy ensued on the rebuilding of the site but eventually a new and rather modern adaptation by Hugh Hardy of Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer was completed in 1978 with an angular, redbrick façade. The west end of the block is anchored by the New School for Social Research, a very fine but small magazine store and a small and quaint Portugese cemetery. P. S. 41, one of the city's finest public schools is just across the avenue of the Americas, one block up from the great landmark Jefferson Market Courthouse library.

This neighborhood is exceeding desirable as it is served by excellent public transportation, numerous religious institutions and abounds in many good restaurants and famous food stores and plentiful neighborhood retail services. Directly across Fifth Avenue at No. 43 is a great apartment building designed by Stanford White and around the corner half a block to the south on the avenue is the Ascension Episcopal Church with its own large corner fenced garden. The ambiance here has few rivals in the city and is very lively because of the Village, the presence of New York University nearby and the proximity to the very trendy Union Square, Flatiron and Chelsea districts.

This 7-story building was erected in 1910 and converted to a cooperative in 1979. He has 34 apartments and no doorman and no garage, but a very impressive Neo-Classical entrance and high ceilings.

Carter B. Horsley