Neue Galerie

1048 5th Avenue | Upper East Side | built 1914

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The lot about 1940
About 1940. Via 1940s.nyc
The lot about 1985
About 1985. Via 80s.nyc

The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.

Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.

  1. 1913

    December

    The New York Times praises the Miller house for 'dignity and simplicity'

    As the house neared completion, The New York Times wrote on December 7, 1913 that it had a dignity and simplicity more pleasing than some of the ornate creations along the avenue. The paper liked the red brick with limestone trim, saying the combination added a cheerful touch of color. It called the house one of more than ordinary importance.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  2. 1914

    Carrère and Hastings complete a French Classical mansion for William Starr Miller

    In 1912, industrialist William Starr Miller hired Carrère & Hastings to design a Louis XIII-style townhouse at Fifth Avenue and 86th Street. When the mansion neared completion in 1914, the New York Times called its brick-and-limestone facade more dignified than the avenue's more ornate mansions.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  3. 1921

    July

    Miller's daughter marries Lord Queenborough in the mansion's music room

    In July 1921 Edith Starr Miller, William's daughter, married the British peer Almeric Hugh Paget, Lord Queenborough, in a ceremony held in the house's music room. The marriage ended bitterly, with Edith suing for separation in 1932 and dying in Paris the next year at 45.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  4. 1935

    September 14

    William Starr Miller dies in the mansion he built

    Miller, who had retired from the law and remained an active industrialist and real estate operator, died in the house on September 14, 1935. His widow stayed on and died there nine years later, in 1944. The mansion had been his home since Carrère and Hastings finished it in 1914.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  5. 1944

    November

    The Miller estate opens the mansion to buyers before auctioning its art and furnishings

    In November 1944, after Mrs. Miller's death, the house was opened for prospective buyers to preview the art and furnishings that were about to be sold at auction. A month earlier the mansion itself had been sold to Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt, whose purchase was reported by The New York Times.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  6. 1944

    Grace Vanderbilt moves in and calls it 'the gardener's cottage'

    After her husband Cornelius Vanderbilt III died in 1942, Grace Vanderbilt gave up the family's much larger Fifth Avenue "Triple Palace" and moved into the Miller mansion by 1944, wryly dismissing her new home as the gardener's cottage even while keeping eighteen servants. She lived there until her death in 1953.

    Source: Ephemeral New York

  7. 1953

    January 8

    Grace Vanderbilt dies of pneumonia in the house she called a gardener's cottage

    Grace Vanderbilt, widow of Cornelius Vanderbilt III and a society leader in New York and Newport, died at 1048 Fifth Avenue of pneumonia on the night of January 8, 1953. She had hosted dinners, charity events and balls in the house after leaving the far larger Vanderbilt mansion at 640 Fifth Avenue.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  8. 1955

    The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research becomes the mansion's third owner

    In 1955 the house changed hands again, this time to an organization rather than a family: the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research. Almost four decades later YIVO sold it to Ronald Lauder and Serge Sabarsky, who turned it into the Neue Galerie.

    Source: Ephemeral New York

  9. 1994

    Ronald Lauder and Serge Sabarsky quietly buy the mansion from YIVO and begin a four-year restoration

    YIVO had converted the house to offices and, short of money, covered its architectural detail rather than stripping it. Cosmetics heir Ronald Lauder and art dealer Serge Sabarsky bought it in 1994 and began restoring it under the architect Annabelle Selldorf. The marble pilasters of the former music room and the oak paneling and carved ornament came back to light.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  10. 2001

    November 16

    The Neue Galerie opens with German and Austrian art

    Art dealer Serge Sabarsky and cosmetics executive Ronald Lauder bought the mansion in 1994 from the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, which had used it as offices since 1955. Architect Annabelle Selldorf restored the interiors, and the Neue Galerie New York opened in the building on November 16, 2001, showing German and Austrian modern art alongside Café Sabarsky.

    Source: Wikipedia

  11. 2006

    Klimt's Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer goes on view at the Neue Galerie

    In 2006 the Neue Galerie put Gustav Klimt's Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer on exhibition after Ronald Lauder bought it for a reported $135 million. The museum, in the former Miller mansion, also holds paintings by Egon Schiele and Paul Klee.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

Further reading

Nearby

All 93 buildings with stories in Upper East Side