The Majestic

115 Central Park West | also 7 West 71st Street, 3 West 71st Street, 5 West 71st Street | Lincoln Square | built 1931

Open on the map11 entries

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. 1894

    The Hotel Majestic once stood on the site, hosting Gustav Mahler

    Before the current tower, the 12-story, 600-room Hotel Majestic, designed by Alfred Zucker, occupies the block from 1894. Guests include composer Gustav Mahler and novelist Edna Ferber. After the hotel is sold in December 1928, it closes in 1929 and is demolished.

    Source: Wikipedia

  2. 1929

    April 25

    The Chanin brothers buy the Hotel Majestic and announce a 45-story apartment hotel

    The Chanin Construction Company bought the 1894 Hotel Majestic on April 25, 1929, and at once announced a $16 million, 45-story hotel to replace it. Irwin Chanin said about half would be studios, maisonettes and duplexes of six to fifteen rooms, with kitchenette apartments in the rest, plus a grand ballroom and large dining rooms. The stock market crash forced the height down to 31 floors.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  3. 1931

    Showman Roxy Rothafel and playwright Harry Herschfield sign leases in the new Majestic

    In April 1931 the Albany Times-Union reported that playwright Harry Herschfield and impresario S. L. 'Roxy' Rothafel would live in the new Majestic. The New York Times described Rothafel's 16th-floor apartment as a ten-room apartment with a 60-foot terrace and sixteen park-facing windows. Rothafel was known for the Roxy Theatre and for Radio City Music Hall, which was still under construction.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  4. 1931

    Irwin Chanin predicts the Majestic will be obsolete by 1981 and seals plans in a wall

    At the 1931 opening Chanin forecast that the new building would be outdated within fifty years and replaced by a glass tower. He said that if it was still standing after 1981 it would be an architectural curiosity. For that day he sealed an envelope inside a wall holding photographs and plans of the old hotel, the new building and the one he expected next, to be taken out if the Majestic were ever demolished.

    “He embedded an envelope within the Majestic's wall containing photos and plans of the old, current, and future buildings on the site…”

    Source: Wikipedia

  5. 1931

    Irwin Chanin's Art Deco Majestic replaces the old hotel

    Developer Irwin S. Chanin buys the Hotel Majestic site on April 25, 1929, and plans a 45-story, $16 million hotel. After the stock market crash he scales the project back to a 31-story Art Deco apartment building with twin towers around a central courtyard. Chanin, influenced by the 1925 Paris decorative arts exposition, takes on the design himself, and the building opens in 1931.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  6. 1932

    April 2

    Bruno Richard Hauptmann works as a Majestic carpenter before his arrest

    Bruno Richard Hauptmann is hired as a carpenter at the Majestic in early 1932, earning $100 a month, and quits on April 2, 1932, the same day the Lindbergh kidnapping ransom is paid. He is arrested in 1934 and later convicted of the kidnapping and murder of the Lindbergh baby.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  7. 1933

    Eleven firefighters are trapped by a blaze in a tenth-floor Majestic apartment

    In March 1933 a fire broke out in the ten-floor apartment of Dr. Edward Sanders. The New York Sun reported that eleven firefighters were trapped inside when their escape was cut off, and two other firemen rescued them. The flames spread to the adjoining apartment and to one on the eleventh floor before they were put out.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  8. 1944

    Detectives wait overnight to serve Frank Costello a subpoena at the Majestic

    In September 1944 Frank Costello was ordered to testify in the city's effort to revoke the Copacabana Club's cabaret license. The New York Sun reported that detectives watched his Central Park West home all night and checked his favorite haunts without finding him. They finally caught him at 8:40 the next morning as he was leaving the Majestic.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  9. 1957

    May 2

    Vincent Gigante shoots mob boss Frank Costello in the Majestic's lobby

    Crime boss Frank Costello, a Majestic resident through the 1940s and 1950s, survives being shot by Vincent Gigante in the building's lobby on May 2, 1957. Costello continues living in the building until his death in 1973.

    Source: Wikipedia

  10. 1958

    July

    The Majestic's tenants buy their building as a cooperative

    In September 1957 a new entity, the 115 Central Park West Corporation, began selling shares to the roughly 1,200 residents. A group of tenants objected and went to court, but the case ended in a settlement. The corporation took title in July 1958, making the Majestic one of twelve Central Park West apartment houses to go cooperative in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and one of the largest.

    “The 115 Central Park West Corporation took title to the Majestic in July 1958.”

    Source: Wikipedia

  11. 1988

    March 8

    The city designates the Majestic a landmark after hearings with ten witnesses in favor

    The Landmarks Preservation Commission held hearings on September 11 and November 13, 1984, at which ten witnesses spoke for designation and none against. It designated the Majestic a city landmark on March 8, 1988. The report calls it an excellent example of streamlined, later Art Deco and says the twin towers answer building rules enacted in 1929.

    “Ten witnesses spoke in favor of designation. No witnesses spoke in opposition to designation.”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

Further reading

Nearby

All 48 buildings with stories in Lincoln Square