The Park Belvedere, 101 West 79th Street: Review and Ratings
at The Northwest corner of Columbus Avenue View Full Building Profile
This very handsome tower commands a splendid site overlooking, to the east, Manhattan Square and the American Museum of Natural History in the foreground, and Central Park just beyond.
More importantly, from a civic standpoint, this building significantly reinforced the upgrading of Columbus Avenue, and gave the Upper West Side and important and attractive, new (unofficial) landmark.
The tower is in context only with the great towers of Central Park West, and its site fits gracefully into the Upper West Side skyline, as seen from the east. It is also the most prominent structure on Columbus Avenue, an avenue that greatly needed such a focus north of 68th Street.
The slender 31-story spire, which was completed in 1985, has quite a complex geometry at its top, yet it is well contained and conservative. Its architect, Frank Williams, designed a somewhat similar, but taller tower, the Belaire at 524 East 72nd Street, a few years later.
The project was one of several pioneering developments undertaken by William Zeckendorf Jr., and World-Wide Realty in the early 1980's. The building has 154 condominium apartments and handsome retail space.
Belvedere Castle, which overlooks Turtle Pond and the Shakespeare in the Park Theater in Central Park, is a short walk inside Central Park from 81st Street.
There is excellent public transportation nearby and numerous restaurants and boutiques.
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