Hotel Wolcott
The Hotel Wolcott is a hotel at 4 West 31st Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues, in the Midtown South neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. Constructed between 1902 and 1904 by developer William C. Dewey, it was designed by John H. Duncan in the French Beaux-Arts and neoclassical styles. The hotel's namesake was Henry Roger Wolcott, a businessman, politician, and philanthropist. The hotel is a New York City designated landmark.
The hotel building is 12 stories tall. Its facade is largely made of red brick and limestone, with elaborate decorations. The facade is divided vertically into six bays and horizontally into a two-story base, a six-story midsection, a transitional story, and a three-story mansard roof. The hotel originally contained several ground-floor amenity areas for guests, including a neo-Grec lobby, reception room, and ballroom. The upper floors are arranged in an "H" shape and originally contained various suites and rooms, which have been rearranged over the years into 160 guestrooms.
Dewey acquired the site in 1902. The hotel opened on March 1, 1904, several months behind schedule, and Dewey had lost the Wolcott to foreclosure by that September. The Wolcott was operated by numerous individuals during the early 20th century, including William and Julius Manger of Manger Hotels during the 1920s. Over the years, it was popular with travelers, though the Wolcott also had permanent residents such as Isadora Duncan, James Buchanan Duke, Doris Duke, Edith Wharton, Mark Twain, and Henry Miller. The Wolcott had declined into a single room occupancy hotel by 1975, when the Erlich family bought it and made numerous renovations. The Wolcott was known as a budget hotel in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, then served as a temporary shelter in the 2020s.
Site
The Wolcott is on the south side of 31st Street, between Broadway and Fifth Avenue, in the Midtown South neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City, at the southern edge of the Koreatown neighborhood. The land lot is nearly square and measures around, with a frontage of and a depth of. The Grand Hotel is on the same block to the west, while the Wilbraham is on the same block to the south. Other nearby buildings include the Marble Collegiate Church and the old Holland House to the south, Gilsey House to the southwest, the Aberdeen Hotel to the north, and the Colony Club building and the Church of the Transfiguration to the southeast.During the mid-19th century, the stretch of Fifth Avenue between 23rd Street and 42nd Street contained brownstones and mansions for some of New York City's wealthiest residents, as well as churches. Many hotels and social clubs opened in what is now NoMad following the opening of the Fifth Avenue Hotel in the 1850s, followed by apartment hotels, apartment buildings, Broadway theaters, and stores in the 1870s. The area's wealthiest residents moved uptown in the 1880s, but the neighborhood remained fashionable for clubs, hotels, and apartment hotels.
Architecture
The building was designed by John Hemenway Duncan, the architect of Grant's Tomb in Upper Manhattan. It is largely designed in the French Beaux-Arts style, with large decorative elements that were characteristic of that style. The structure is 12 stories high and has light courts facing east and west, giving it an "H" shape.Facade
The Wolcott has a limestone and brick facade, with elaborate decorations. The facade is symmetrical and is divided vertically into six bays; the two center bays comprise the main entrance. It is split horizontally into a two-story base, six-story midsection, and two-story capital. Most of the original facade decorations remain intact, but most of the original wooden windows have been replaced with one-over-one metal sash windows. The northern elevation of the facade is the only side with ornamentation; the western and eastern elevations have plain brick facades with a small number of windows.The base is clad with rusticated blocks of stone. There is an arch at the center of the double-height ground story, with a pair of metal-and-glass doors within the arch, topped by a transom window. In front of the entrance doorways is a terrace that is raised slightly above the ground, with a short stone partition wall extends from the facade on either side of the terrace. A marquee with a skylight and recessed lights is cantilevered over the main entrance, above which is an oversized cartouche and an ornate keystone. To the east of the main entrance, there is a metal-and-glass door, a ramp leading to an automatic sliding door, and a service entrance. To the west is a wood-and-glass door with a semicircular glass pane above, followed by two of the original sash windows. There is a recessed areaway in front of the westernmost windows. Over the years, a metal sign with the hotel's name, security cameras, and an air-conditioner have been added to the ground floor. There are windows on the second floor, topped by a cornice that separates the base and midsection.
The third through eighth stories have a pink-brick facade, with vertical stone piers and quoins, and are largely similar to one another. There are horizontal string courses above the third and eighth stories, as well as various brackets, cartouches, and other decorations above the windows. Between the third and seventh stories, the two center bays of the Wolcott's facade have oriel windows with curved glass; at the time of the hotel's construction, such windows were expensive and thus generally rare in New York City. The remaining bays have simple sash windows with copper balconettes. At the third story, the balconettes are made of stone and contain spotlights. There is another oversized cartouche between the two center bays above the eighth story, with the name "Wolcott" carved into it.
The ninth story has a stone facade and is treated as a "transitional story". On this story, the windows are recessed between pairs of large brackets that support a protruding copper cornice with giant dentils. The hotel building contains a triple-height mansard roof with copper cresting. The roof formerly had finials and other ornate details; the copper cresting was added during a later modification.
Features
From the outset, the Wolcott was intended as a fireproof building; the hotel's steel frame was built using what was known as the "Roebling system". The Wolcott also had modern mechanical systems for its time, including ice-making machines, a laundry room, a private steam plant, and a heating and ventilation system.Public rooms
The Wolcott originally had a vestibule leading to a lobby, both designed in the Neo-Grec style. The vestibule and lobby were decorated in verde antique green, white and gold. The ceiling had elaborate moldings, as well as gold-colored brackets. Some of the marble has been replaced with wood over the years, and the ceiling has been painted to match the color of the carpet. The modern lobby is in the Louis XVI style and has marble columns and a chandelier. The lobby ends at a check-in counter.A parlor and ladies' reception room led off the left side of the vestibule, while a cafe and smoking room led off the right side. The latter rooms contained a high leaded glass ceiling. To the right of the lobby was an office with green-and-white marble pilasters and counters, as well as a mosaic floor with an ornamental border and centerpiece. Near the center of the hotel, there was also a palm room to the left of the lobby and a children's dining room to the right. The palm room was a classical-style space decorated with Caen stone; the ceiling of the palm room had trellises. There was also a mezzanine level with several private dining rooms. By the 2000s, the hotel had a fitness room, business center, and a conference room, as well as a self-service laundry.
The ground story also has a ballroom covering. Originally an elaborate ballroom, it measured across and was designed in the Louis XVI style. The ballroom was decorated in a white, gray, and gold color scheme, with red plush hangings, and was illuminated by full-height windows on its rear wall. The decorations included Baroque-style moldings, a mosaic-tile floor, a dozen Palladian windows, a set of columns with scagliola-style plaster capitals, and a coffered ceiling. The ceiling is variously cited as measuring or high. A musicians' gallery with palms and shrubs overlooked the ballroom. The space had become a jazz club by the 1990s before being largely abandoned in the 2000s.
Guestrooms
The upper stories are arranged in an "H" shape, with a hallway connecting to a pair of emergency staircases. Two passenger elevators and a freight elevator, clustered at the center of the hotel, also served all stories. There were telephones in each room and mail chutes in the hallways.According to a brochure published from the hotel's opening, every suite and almost every guestroom had a bathroom, and both the bedrooms and bathrooms were illuminated by natural light. The brochure also described the hotel as having many closets and full-height mirrors and windows. The closets in each bedroom have large hooks for women's dresses, which, at the time of the hotel's construction, tended to be heavy. By the 2000s, the rooms had been redecorated with striped wallpaper and "muted Federalist" designs. The modern-day hotel has about 160 or 165 units, most of which have sparse furnishings and small bathrooms. Although the rooms have air-conditioning and TVs, they do not have mini fridges or coffee machines; according to one critic, the rooms with queen-sized beds only had enough space for a nightstand, an armoire, and a small closet.