700 Park Avenue: Review and Ratings

Review of 700 Park Avenue by Carter Horsley

One of the nicest post-World War II apartment buildings on the avenue, 700 Park Avenue was designed in 1959 by Kahn & Jacobs and Paul Resnick and Harry F. Green on the northwest corner at 69^th Street. 

A co-operative, the 19-story building, which is also known as 37 East 69^th Street, has 48 apartments. 

It is directly across the avenue from the very elegant Union Club, designed by Delano & Aldrich.

Bottom Line

With a prime Park Avenue location close to the Asia Society, the Union Club, Hunter College and the Seventh Regiment Armory, this elegant post-war co-operative apartment building has considerably more “light and air” than many of its famous pre-war neighbors and very large apartments.

Description

The building has a glazed gray brick façade over a two-story base on the avenue of polished granite. Its façades are nicely punctuated by slightly protruding stone window frames and, on the avenue, one bay of windows is a small 4-by-4 cluster of inserted windows that adds a bit of delicacy to the building’s bulk. 

The top of the building is quite handsome with four major setbacks along the avenue with continuous glass balconies. 

The building has a canopied entrance with sidewalk landscaping.

Amenities

The building has a doorman, storage facilities, a garage and a canopied entrance. It permits pets.

Apartments

Apartment 10C has a 20-foot-long entrance foyer that leads to a 31-foot-long living room with an adjoining solarium and a 23-foot-long bedroom.  The apartment also has a second bedroom, a 15-foot-long dining room, a 9-foot-long pantry, a 16-foot-long enclosed, windowed kitchen and a 9-foot-long maid’s room.

 Apartment 16B is a two-bedroom apartment that has a 16-foot-wide entrance gallery that leads to a 27-foot-long living room with a wood-burning fireplace, an 18-foot-long library, a 22-foot-long dining room next to an enclosed, window 17-foot-long kitchen next to a pantry and a 12-foot-long maid’s room. 

Apartment 11A has a 21-foot-long entrance gallery that leads to a 27-foot-long living room with wood-burning fireplace next to a 16-foot-long corner library and across from a windowed, eat-in kitchen and 17-foot-long dining room.  The unit also has a 14-foot-long exercise room and a pantry.

History

This site was once occupied by the Union Theological Seminary and later served as the residence of Arthur Curtis James (1867-1947), whose grandfather Daniel James made a fortune in mining in the Southwest and whose father D. Willis James financed the railroad ventures of James J. Hill. Arthur Curtis James, who at one time had a railroad empire that included about one-seventh of all the track in the country, was also the commodore of the New York Yacht Club.