George Washington Hotel | |
West and South sides, 2021 | |
| Location | Gramercy Park, Manhattan, New York, NY |
|---|---|
| Coordinates | 40°44′23″N73°59′05″W / 40.739627°N 73.984647°W /40.739627; -73.984647 |
| Built | 1930 |
| Architect | Frank Mills Andrews, John Peterkin |
| Architectural style | FrenchRenaissance Revival |
| Website | freehandhotels |
| NRHP reference No. | 100003931 |
| Added to NRHP | May 20, 2019 |
TheFreehand New York Hotel is located at 23Lexington Avenue (between23rd Street and24th Street) inGramercy Park,Manhattan,New York City.
Located adjacent to theBaruch College andSchool of Visual Arts campuses, the hotel was opened in 1928 as theGeorge Washington Hotel. At different times it has been used both as a brothel and as aboot-legging house duringProhibition.
In the 1980s, the hotel was raided by the police.[1] For a period of time the building was in receivership; its demolition was prevented by support from a local historical society. The hotel was later purchased at auction, and space was leased to not-for-profit Educational Housing Services in the mid-1990s. Much of the space was under sublease to the School of Visual Arts except for apartments still occupied by original (non-student) tenants who pay stabilized rent, and who are still protected under NYC rent laws. SVA broke the sublease and built a new dorm on 24th Street in mid-2016. The ground lease for the property was bought by investment firm Alliance Bernstein in 2016. The company developed the property into a hotel[2] which is now known as the Freehand/New York.[3][4]
In 2019 it was listed on theNational Register of Historic Places.[5]
The building was occupied by many famous writers, musicians, and poets. These includeW. H. Auden andChristopher Isherwood, who lived there in the 1930s; Auden even dedicated a poem to the hotel.[6] Another wasKeith Haring, who lived in the building as a student at SVA.
In the late 1960s,Minoru Yamasaki and a team of architects drafted the early plans for theWorld Trade Center in a suite at the George Washington. From 1975 until his death in 1979Al Hodge, who playedCaptain Video in the popular children's 1950s TV series, lived in an inexpensive rental unit in the hotel. In the 1990sDee Dee Ramone occupied a room there, as did playwrightJeffrey Stanley and comedianJudah Friedlander.