40 East 66th Street: Review and Ratings

Review of 40 East 66th Street by Carter Horsley

This attractive, 13-story apartment building at 40 West 66^th Street on the southeast corner at Madison Avenue was erected in 1929 and converted to a condominium by Vornado Realty Trust in 2008. 

It was developed by Edward Kaye and A. Morris Levy and designed by Rosario Candela. 

It originally had 35 three-bedroom apartments and now has 33 condominium apartments.

Bottom Line

A good pre-war building in a prime location among the boutiques of Madison Avenue and on an important cross-town bus route. It is also not far from Central Park and the zoo and the 68^th Street subway station on Lexington Avenue.

Description

The red-brick building has corner quoins and a two-story limestone base and a red-brick façade with some decorative balconies on the 9^th floor and a small cornice.

Amenities

The building has a 24-hour doorman, a gym, a children’s playroom, a bicycle and stroller room, and a live-in superintendent.

Apartments

Apartments have wood-burning fireplaces, and kitchens have Viking stoves and SubZero refrigerators and wine coolers and Miele dishwashers. 

According to Andrew Alpern’s fine book, “The New York Apartment Houses of Rosario Candela and James Carpenter,” the corner unit “has the anomaly of the dining room being larger in each dimensions than the living room.”  “This was not uncommon,” he continued, “in the period prior to 1910, when the dining room served as the everyday ‘family room’’ with the front parlor reserved for entertaining visitors, but it is unusual in buildings constructed after World War I.” 

Apartment 6B is a three-bedroom unit that has a 17-foot-long entrance gallery off the elevator vestibule that leads to a 23-foot-long living room with a fireplace and a 23-foot-long dining room next to an enclosed kitchen and a maid’s room. 

Apartment 3A is a two-bedroom unit that has a 13-foot-long entrance gallery that leads to a 28-foot-long living/dining room and 13-foot-long library and a long enclosed, windowed kitchen. 

Apartment 3C is a three-bedroom unit that has a 16-foot-long entrance gallery off of the elevator vestibule that leads to a 23-foot-long living room with a fireplace and a 14-foot-long enclosed dining room next to a large kitchen and breakfast room and an 110-foot-long maid’s room. 

Apartment 11B is a four-bedroom unit with a 19-foot-long entrance gallery that leads to a 26-foot-long living room with a fireplace , a 16-foot-long library, a 16-foot-long dining room, a 15-foot-long family room, and a 27-foot-long, enclosed, windowed kitchen with an island and a butler’s pantry.  The master bedroom has a fireplace.