United States Post Office Lenox Hill Station | |
 (2009) | |
    | |
| Location | 217East 70th Street Manhattan,New York City |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 40°46′4″N73°57′36″W / 40.76778°N 73.96000°W /40.76778; -73.96000 |
| Built | 1935[2] |
| Architect | Eric Kebbon; U.S. Treasury Department |
| Architectural style | Colonial Revival |
| MPS | US Post Offices in New York State, 1858-1943, TR |
| NRHP reference No. | 88002363[1] |
| Added to NRHP | May 11, 1989 |
TheUnited States Post Office–Lenox Hill Station is located at 217East 70th Street betweenSecond andThird Avenues in theLenox Hill neighborhood of theUpper East Side,Manhattan,New York City. It is a brick building constructed in 1935 and designed byEric Kebbon in theColonial Revival style, and is considered one of the finest post offices in that style inNew York State. It was listed on theNational Register of Historic Places in 1989, along with many other post offices in the state.[1]
The post office is located on the north side of the street, midway between the two avenues. The neighboring buildings are large apartment houses, modern on either side of the post office and older across the street.[2]
There are two sections to the building. Both are three stories in height, with the first story faced inrusticatedlimestone on agranitefoundation and the upper stories in brick laid inFlemish bond with limestone trim. The five-bay main section has a three-bay central projecting front-gabledpavilion with a stonepediment. To the east is a three-bay wing with a segmental-archedgarage.[2]
On the main block, the south-facing first floor windows are all tripartite round-arched windows with 8-over-12 double-hung woodensash windows in the center, five-pane sidelights and compoundfanlights. They are complemented by a projectingkeystone and radiatingvoussoirs.[2]
The second floor windows are 12-over-12 double-hung sash with limestonebalustrades in front on the main block. On the pavilion they are additionally topped with stonepediments; segmental arched with supportingbrackets in the center and triangular in the middle. On the main block and the wing they have projecting stone lintels.[2]
Above them, the third floor windows are four-over-eight sash with simple stone surrounds. The central window in the pavilion has a shouldered surround withvolutes at the base. Below it a flagpole projects from a limestone panel between it and the second-story window below.[2]
The pavilion's gable is trimmed in limestone. At its bottom is a plainfrieze with "United States Post Office"carved into it. Theentablature is set off by acornice and has a central carvedroundel depicting an eagle and shield. The shallow pitched roof is sheathed in metal.[2]
Balustraded granite steps on either side of the projecting pavilion lead to the main entrances. They have bronze doors topped by blind fanlights with eagles carved inbas-relief. Original lamps are still in place.[2] They open into avestibule with rusticated limestone walls. The lobby has aterrazzo floor in gray, gold and blackmarble, green marblebaseboard, appliedDoric order in honey-coloredmarble around the entire room, square plaster cornice and shallow squaredcoffered plaster ceiling. Doors have limestone surrounds with marbletransoms. Small Doricpilasters divide the teller windows, which retain their original bronze grilles. Three of the original customer tables remain. They are bronze with glass tops and Greek-inspired decorated bases.[2]
Lenox Hill was one of 12 post offices built in mid-1930s Manhattan as part of federal relief efforts in the face of the ongoingGreat Depression. An amendment to thePublic Buildings Act in 1930 gave theTreasury Department'sSupervising Architect the authority to hire outside consulting architects to design buildings, to provide work for unemployed architects. In New York, many of those architects built post offices in theNew York metropolitan area.[2]
Eric Kebbon, still employed in private practice at the time, was retained to design five Manhattan post offices. Prior to working for the Treasury Department he had designed the AT&T building atBroadway andFulton Street. Later he would, as the architect forthe city's school system, design over a hundred school buildings.[2]
Kebbon, unlike some other consulting architects, appears to have been given complete freedom in designing the Lenox Hill post office, which serves some of Manhattan's wealthiest neighborhoods. His design, which has been called the finestColonial Revival post office in the state, is similar to his later Planetarium post office across town on theUpper West Side, but less restrained in itsdecoration. Many elements are common to other New York City post offices, such as the multi-story main block, full lot coverage and raised basement. Unlike many Colonial Revival post offices in the state, both inside and outside the city, it has two entrances on the side of the projecting pavilion instead of one entrance in the middle.[2]
Notes
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