650 Park Avenue: Review and Ratings

Review of 650 Park Avenue by Carter Horsley

This attractive, 21-story, white glazed brick apartment building at 650 Park Avenue on the southwest corner at 67^th Street was erected in 1963 and designed by Kokkins & Lyras whose other Manhattan buildings include 16 Sutton Place and Sutton Town House. John M. Kokkins designed the building and was a member of the investment group that sponsored the co-op and headed the construction firm that erected it.

The building has 98 co-operative apartments.

Bottom Line

A white-brick building with impressive layouts and good soundproofing in a prime location across from the 7^th Regiment Armory.

Description

According to an August 23, 1963 article in The New York Times, the building was designed to be “as soundproof as possible.”

“In all rooms except the kitchens, which have been given a different treatment, the six-and-a-half-thick concrete floor slabs have been line with a half-inch thick layer of sound-deadening cork.  The cork also forms the base for a surface of oak parquet flooring blocks.  The concrete floor slabs in the kitchens have been covered with an inch-and-a-half layer of a resilient mixture of sand, cement and vermiculite. This base, which is surfaced by vinyl flooring, helps deaden sound between floors and also provides a resilience that helps to eliminate the fatigue usually felt when walking on standing on concrete-based floors.  The wall between the apartments contain an inch-and-a-half thickness of mineral wool to prevent the transmission of sound.  The walls are constructed of three-inch-thick gypsum blocks separated by an 9nch-and-a-half of air space, which has been filled with mineral wool.

Amenities

The building has a doorman and a concierge, a garage with a waiting room for chauffeurs, a storage room, and a canopied entrance.

It has no roof deck and no balconies but some terraces.

Apartments

There is a bathroom for every bedroom and every apartment has a powder room.

Apartment 21AB is a two-bedroom unit with a 10-foot-long entry foyer that leads to a 26-foot-long living room with a 27-foot-long terrace, 16-foot-long library, a 20-foot-lon den with very large bay window, a 16-foot-long dining room with a 26-foot-long  terrace, next to a 13-foot-long kitchen.  A 31-foot-long hallway runs from the den to the bedrooms that are adjacent and have access to a six-sided terrace.

Apartment 15/16A is a two-bedroom duplex with an 18-foot-wide entry foyer with a semi-circular staircase, a 21-foot-long living room that opens onto a 27-foot-long terrace, a 15-foot-long dining room next to a pass-through, 15-foot-long kitchen on the lower level.  The bedrooms are on the upper level.

Apartment 19B is a two-bedroom unit with a 10-foot-long entry foyer that opens onto a 25-foot-long living room with a decorative fireplace, a 17-foot-long dining room and a windowed 13-foot-long kitchen.   A six-sided terrace wraps around one of the bedrooms, the kitchen and the dining room.

Apartment 18A is a two-bedroom unit with a 17-foot-long entry gallery that leads to a 24-foot-long living room with a decorative fireplace across from a 19-foot-long formal dining room next to a 15-foot-long enclosed kitchen and a 12-foot-long breakfast room.  The apartment also has a 25-foot-long library.

Apartment 11F is a two-bedroom unit with a 12-foot-square entry foyer that opens onto a 25-foot-long living room and a 20-foot-long dining room next to a 20-foot-long kitchen and pantry and an 11-foot-long staff room.

\Apartment 17B is a two-bedroom unit with a 14-foot-long entrance gallery that leads to a 26-foot-long living room with a 28-foot-long terrace that is next to a 17-foot-long library and a 16-foot-long dining room next to a 16-foot-long kitchen.

Apartment 7C is a two-bedroom unit with a 12-foot-long entry foyer that opens onto a 24-foot-long living room with a 14-foot-long dining alcove next to an 8-foot-long kitchen.

History

The site was formerly occupied by the Sulgrave Hotel.

In his June 4, 2006 “Streetscapes” column in The New York Times, Christopher Gray wrote that Leo Klein and Samuel Jackson bought four townhouses in 1923 at 54-60 East 67^th Street but where unsuccessful in getting the owner of the townhouse on Park Avenue from Sofia T. Hawkins.  The developers, the article continued, built the 15-story Sulgrave Hotel in the middle of the block but when Ms. Hawkins died in 1929 they were able to buy it and demolish it and replace it with a 20-by-80-foot garden.’

“The hotel had been designed by rouse & Goldstone, and William L. Rouse returned to reconstruction the bare Park Avenue side of the Sulgrave.  Ata the ground floor he put in French doors to a $50,000 garden and adorned the newly exposed wall with neo-Classical details in brick and stone.  The Sulgrave garden had bamboo chairs and metal tables set out on picturesque, irregular flagstones with wide joints filled with grass.  Photographs show it separated from the street only by a low brick wall and a hedge.  By 1950, The Times reported that the garden had been converted to a 100-seat restaurant, apparently with some king of canopy, and in 1956 the restaurant space was built as a two-story hotel annex,” the article continued.

In 1976, the building switched their manually operated elevators to automatic during a building employees strike.

The building has a prime Upper East Side location and is across the avenue from the historic and handsome Seventh Regiment Armory and is close to a Lexington Avenue subway station at 68^th Street.