Madison Avenue Building

Photo shows buildings on east side Madison Avenue from Madison Square Park, NYC. The block between East 24th Street and East 25th Street is in the center. Photograph by Irving Underhill copyrighted 1912. Source: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

The main subject of this photograph is the Madison Avenue Building at 25 Madison Avenue, southeast corner of 25th Street, elevated vertical view in winter, side and main Madison Avenue façades. The building was nearing completion. It replaced the five-story Madison Park Apartments, the former residence of Henry S. Harper on Madison Avenue and the eight-story Barrington Apartments. This 20-story building was designed in a modified Florentine style by Charles A. Valentine (born in New York City in 1868), who filled plans for its construction by November, 1911. The first three stories were of white marble and the upper seventeen of white mat glazed terra cotta relieved in the bays and at the cornice by polychrome treatment. It was erected by A. Fillmore Hyde and opened in the second half of 1912 or early 1913, with lofts and offices leased by Stephen H. Tyng Jr. & Co. In the 1930s, it was replaced by Metropolitan Life's North Building.

At left, on the northeast corner of 25th Street, is the New York Appellate Courthouse, completed in 1899. At right, on the northeast corner of 24th Street is the Madison Square Presbyterian Church (1906-1919). The 16-story Pullman Building, at 17 Madison Avenue, which opened in May 1911, adjoins the church.

The Dunlop Building, between Madison Avenue Building and Pullman Building was erected in 1912 on the site of the former home of John R. Hegeman, president of the Mutual Life Insurance Company.

The 48-story Metropolitan Life Insurance Tower (Napoleon LeBrun & Sons) was completed in 1909 and was the world's tallest building until 1913, when it was surpassed by the Woolworth Building, on Broadway.