The Studio Building, 131 East 66th Street: Review and Ratings

Review of 131 East 66th Street by Carter Horsley

One of the purest Italian Renaissance-palazzo style apartment buildings in the city, this building, known as the Studio Building, was built in 1906 and converted to a cooperative in 1949. It is a Designated NYC Landmark.

The 12-story building is a virtual twin of the building that occupies the northern portion of the Lexington Avenue blockfront at 130 East 67th Street. It has, however, a more favorite site because it is across the sidestreet from the Roman Catholic Church of St. Vincent Ferrer designed by Bertram G. Goodhue. Both buildings are across the avenue from the full-block Seventh Regiment Armory, whose main entrance and more attractive façade is on Park Avenue. Nevertheless, the armory and the church provide this building with considerable "light and air."

The building, which was 32 large apartments, was designed by Charles A. Platt for William J. Taylor, who had developed "studio" apartment buildings on the West Side. Mr. Platt was a member of the architectural firm of Pollard & Steinam when he designed this building and switched to the firm of Rossiter & Wright to design its "twin" on 67th Street.

It is one of the few formal apartment buildings that has many apartments with living rooms with very high ceilings, most of which were planned to have north light. None of these living rooms can be detected on the street façades of this building but some are visible on those of the 67th Street building.

The building is distinguished by its very handsome and large cornice and its very impressive entrance portals flanked by columns and topped with broken pediments on the sidestreet. The building has a nice, tall, wrought-iron fence and four stringcourses. The architect, who originally had an apartment in the building, visually broke up the long sidestreet façade by slightly protruding the middle stringcourses beneath the windows in the center of the façade, a quite subtle touch. The building fortunately retains its consistent multipaned fenestration.

It has a doorman and the second floor has nice wrought-iron balconies. The building has no garage and no sidewalk landscaping. Cross-town buses and a local subway station are nearby on 67th Street as is a police precinct. Hunter College is two blocks to the north on the avenue where there is considerable traffic. There is very good neighborhood shopping in the vicinity.