The Whitby, 325 West 45th Street: Review and Ratings

Review of 325 West 45th Street by Carter Horsley

This handsome, pre-war apartment building at 325 West 45^th Street between Eighth and Ninth avenues in the Theater District is known as The Whitby and was designed by Emery Roth for Bing & Bing.

The 10-story, mid-block building has 217 apartments and was erected in 1924.

It was converted to a co-operative in 1986.

According to a December 29, 2014 article in The New York Times by Matt A. V. Chaban, “it was the first residential building in city created especially” for artists, performers, writers and stagehands.”

“What the actors especially valued…was the telephone service, a rarity in the day that kept them apprised of all their callbacks,” Mr. Chaban wrote, adding that its residents have included Doris Day and Betty Grable “as well as Al Capone, though legend says it was the showgirls, not the amenities, that drew him there.”

In an August 7, 1991 article in The Times, Douglas Martin recalled when he had dinner in the building with Roy Pinney, a retired photographer.  “If it doesn’t offend you, I have a friend I’d like to have join us for the meal,” Mr. Pinney told him, “proceeding to set a box turtle, about eight inches long and a half century old, on the table.”  “It stared down a shrimp as it if owed her money, shoved it with a clawed foot, then proceeded to make peculiar sounds, not unlike those of an elderly person with no teeth, as she blissfully dined.”

“Before our chat concluded,” the reporter continued, “we would hear enough scaly stories to fill the lifespan of a sea turtle” in “this herpetological heaven.”

A January 4, 1988 article on the building in The Times by Elizabeth Neuffer noted that “most days, Cecile Chauveau, a French singer, has a tea party in the lobby with her pet pigeon Pousson and Wally Radeau, a former female impersonator and vaudeville actor.”

Bottom Line

A good looking, pre-war, side-street, apartment building in the Theater District designed by Emery Roth for Bing & Bing that for decades was a residential haunt for theatrical folk and some of their pets.

Description

The attractive, beige-brick building has three wings on the side-street with a canopy entrance flanked by very attractive sconces.

The building has two dark bandcourses and an attractive cornice.

It has some discrete air-conditioners.

Amenities

The building has a full-time doorman and a superintendent, a roof deck, a laundry room, a bicycle room, storage and a large roof deck.

Apartments

Penthouse B is a one-bedroom unit with a 14-foot-wide living room with a 10-foot-wide pass-through kitchen, a 10-foot-wide home office and three terraces.

Penthouse C is a one-bedroom unit with a 14-foot-wide living room, a 7-foot-long kitchen and three terraces.

Apartment 204-205 is a three-bedroom unit with a long entry foyer that leads to a 21-foot-long living room adjacent to a 12-foot-long dining area by the 16-foot-wide open kitchen with an island.

Apartment 505 is a two-bedroom unit with a long entry foyer leading to a 20-foot-wide living room and a kitchenette.

Apartment 911 is a one-bedroom unit with a long entry foyer that leads to a 15-foot-wide living room with an open kitchen.