Starrett–Lehigh Building
The Starrett–Lehigh Building is a 19-story building at 601 West 26th Street, occupying the full block between Eleventh Avenue, 26th Street, Twelfth Avenue, and 27th Street, in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It was built between 1930 and 1931 by the Starrett Corporation and the Lehigh Valley Railroad, who formed a joint venture to develop a freight terminal and warehouse to replace the railroad's previous freight terminal. The structure was designed by the firm of Cory & Cory, with Yasuo Matsui as the associate architect and the firm of Purdy & Henderson as the consulting structural engineers. The Starrett–Lehigh Building has largely been used as an office building since the late 1990s.
Much of the Starrett–Lehigh Building is 18 stories tall; the central portion is 19 stories tall, while the westernmost portion is nine stories tall due to the site's geology. The building's facade has alternating bands of steel strip windows, brickwork, polygonal corners, and large setbacks. The interior has large concrete floor plates, with a total volume of and a rentable floor area of. There was a rail yard and driveways at ground level, as well as three freight elevators that carried trucks to delivery bays on the upper levels. Widely acclaimed on its completion, the Starrett–Lehigh Building was displayed at the Museum of Modern Art's 1932 "Modern Architecture: International Exhibition", and its design was imitated by other structures. Although the exterior remains intact, the railroad tracks have been removed, and many of the old freight-delivery areas have been converted into amenity spaces.
A freight terminal on the site was announced in 1928, and the LV acquired the lots in early 1930; the Starrett Corporation leased the site's air rights later that year. The building was completed in December 1931 and sold to the LV the next year following the death of William A. Starrett, head of the Starrett Corporation. The LV sold the building to Jacob Friedus in 1944, and the rail lines were removed in the mid-20th century. Occupancy peaked in the 1940s and early 1950s, when 5,000 people worked at the Starrett–Lehigh Building, but the structure was 40 percent vacant by the early 1970s. Harry Helmsley acquired the building at an auction in 1974 and owned it until his death in 1997. A syndicate of investors bought the Starrett–Lehigh Building in 1998 and renovated it, attracting dot-com companies and later fashion firms. The structure was sold again in 2011 to RXR Realty, which conducted further renovations in the late 2010s and early 2020s.
Site
The Starrett–Lehigh Building is at 601-625 West 26th Street in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It occupies a full city block bounded by Eleventh Avenue to the east, 26th Street to the south, Twelfth Avenue to the west, and 27th Street to the north. The trapezoidal site covers and measures approximately long to the north, long to the east, long to the south, and long to the west. The building was developed by the Starrett Corporation and the Lehigh Valley Railroad, on the site of a former freight terminal for the latter.The building stands on filled land along the eastern shore of the North River. Until the early 19th century, the shoreline had been located just west of modern-day Tenth Avenue, further east. The neighborhood was expanded west to Eleventh Avenue in the 1850s through land reclamation, but it took several more decades to expand the land area further westward to Twelfth Avenue. The land lots on the city block were first platted in 1858, when records indicate that Isaac E. Smith and Ichabod T. Williams operated lumber yards on the site. The LV leased all of the land lots on the block in 1900 and opened a carload freight terminal on the site around 1905. Cars from the LV's rail yard in Jersey City, New Jersey, on the opposite shore of the Hudson River, were transported to the terminal in Manhattan using car floats.
Architecture
The Starrett–Lehigh Building was designed by brothers Walter and Russell Cory. Yasuo Matsui was the associate architect, and the firm of Purdy & Henderson were the consulting structural engineers. The building features large setbacks, polygonal corners, and alternating bands of steel strip windows, brickwork, and concrete floor plates. The design mixes elements of European modern architecture, which used horizontal lines for emphasis, and American industrial architecture, which was largely utilitarian. The design, unconventional for industrial buildings of its time, has also been characterized as expressionist.Form
The Starrett–Lehigh Building consists of various sections that are up to 19 stories high, excluding a mezzanine above the first story. The Skyscraper Center and Emporis give the building's height as, although another source published shortly after the building's completion cited the building as tall. The building had been planned as a 15-story structure, with each story covering the entire site. During construction, the geology of the site forced a change to the current layout of a 19-story section in the middle, flanked by a 9-story wing to the west and an 18-story wing to the east.The lowest seven stories fill the entire block. The 8th and 9th stories are shaped like double "H"s, with two setbacks on the facade's north and south elevations. These setbacks divide the building into five sections from west to east; the first, third, and fifth sections from the west protrude outward, while the other two sections are recessed. Each section of the building contains multiple setbacks, except for the first section, which is nine stories high and has no setbacks. The third section, known as the "central utilities section", is 19 stories high with two mechanical floors; the southern elevation has setbacks on the 10th, 13th, and 16th floors, while the northern elevation features a setback only on the 10th floor. The second, fourth, and fifth sections are 18 stories high, and the northern and southern elevations have setbacks at the 13th and 14th stories. The eastern elevation of the fifth section is also set back above the 14th story.
There are polygonal corners along most of the facade, which form S-curves where the projecting and recessed sections meet, except for parts of the central section. There is also a roof terrace at the 10th story, above the first section, which covers and functions as a tenant lounge. There is also a roof garden on the terrace., the roof terrace was planned to be redesigned with landscaping, seating areas, a pergola, a fountain, an art garden, and glass parapets.
Facade
The western and eastern elevations of the facade are each divided vertically into nine bays. On the southern elevation, the facade is divided into 12 bays to the west of the central section and 11 bays to the east of that section. The central utilities section itself is six bays wide. On the northern elevation, the facade is divided into 12 bays on either side of the central utilities section, which is also six bays wide.The interior of the western part of the ground story is partially visible from the street. There is a mezzanine above part of the ground level on the southern elevation, as well as above the entirety of the northern elevation. Generally, the bays of the first story, mezzanine, and second story are divided by vertical brick piers with stone bases. At ground level, each bay has either a loading dock, a roll-down gate, cinderblock or brick walls, storefronts, louvers, or vehicular openings. On the mezzanine and second story, the piers separate windows in each bay. The main entrance is on 26th Street, at the center of the central utilities section. At ground level, there are vehicular ramps on the western and eastern elevations; some of the ground-level openings on the western elevation have been walled up, and the eastern elevation also contains storefronts. On both the western and eastern elevations, there are sash windows on the mezzanine and second story.
On all elevations above the second floor, the facade is generally oriented horizontally, with windows stretching across much of the facade. Brick spandrel panels separate windows on different stories. The windows were unusually large compared to other industrial buildings at the time of the building's completion. The floor slabs were cantilevered from behind the facade, which increased the risk that the windows could break if heavy loads caused the floor slabs to move. As a result, the builders installed custom windows that could expand and contract slightly whenever the floor slabs moved. The building originally had 110,000 glass panes, most of which were part of multi-paned sash windows. Many of the original windows have been replaced by ventilation openings and louvers over the years.
In contrast to the rest of the facade, the southern elevation of the central utilities section generally contains vertical brick piers that extend the facade's height. The windows in these bays are smaller than in the rest of the facade, and there are horizontal band courses above the third floor. The top three stories of the central section's northern elevation also have vertical piers.
Features
The Starrett–Lehigh Building occupies an entire city block and was intended for the railroad industry. It has of space and of rentable floor area. Utilities were grouped in a mechanical core at the center of the building. This mechanical core was constructed of steel and was completed before the upper stories' concrete superstructure was finished.Freight loading areas
As with the Terminal Warehouse Central Stores Building on the next block north, trains could be operated directly into the ground floor of the building. Car floats transported railroad cars across the Hudson River to Pier 66 on the Manhattan shoreline. The entire ground floor included rail sidings; loading and unloading facilities for trucks; warehouse areas for storage, repackaging, redistribution, and manufacturing facilities; and areas to display goods. The railroad tracks extended west–east across the ground floor, which also contained driveways and platforms. The New York Herald Tribune wrote in 1944 that the ground level "was virtually a railroad freight yard". The columns on the first two stories are spaced irregularly to coordinate with the railroad track arrangements and to allow delivery trucks to maneuver within the building more easily. I-beams measuring deep were installed to support the upper stories. As such, the second story only occupies part of its site. The railroad tracks were removed in the mid-20th century.Trucks entered the building on 27th Street. They traveled under the railroad tracks and drove into a truck pit that could fit up to nine trucks, where a dispatcher directed drivers to a freight elevator. Originally, the building had three freight elevators, which transported the trucks to a higher floor for loading and unloading. This eliminated the need for truck drivers to idle at the curb and block traffic. The elevators themselves were known as "vertical streets", and the use of the elevators allowed the building to operate as if "every floor is a first floor". Trucks left the building from 26th Street, which eliminated the need to reverse out of the building. The large number of truck elevators and loading bays was unusual among freight terminals in New York City; according to The New York Times, such features required "large sites with favorable grade conditions". During the 2000s, two of the three truck elevators were replaced with passenger elevators, and 11 passenger elevators were added. Tenants such as Martha Stewart continued to use the remaining freight elevator.