Argonaut Building

224 West 57th Street | also 1758 Broadway | Midtown | built 1909

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

  1. 1909

    September

    Peerless opens a New York building that sells, repairs and rebuilds its luxury cars under one roof

    The Peerless Motor Car Company of New York, a branch of the Cleveland firm, finished its L-shaped building at the end of September 1909. A 1910 company publication described a ground-floor salesroom with an office on the mezzanine, and nine upper floors of workrooms for rebuilding, repairs and special orders, staffed by about 250 operatives. Peerless made luxury cars that, with Packard and Pierce-Arrow, were known as the Three P's.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  2. 1918

    October

    General Motors acquires both buildings and joins them into its New York headquarters

    Chevrolet leased the Demarest building in May 1917 and bought it in October 1918, the same month General Motors acquired the Peerless building from Doan Realty. Chevrolet, by then a GM division, passed its building to the parent company in November 1918. Henry J. Hardenbergh's firm joined the two buildings on the inside, keeping the ground-floor showrooms. The merged building held general offices plus those of Chevrolet, the General Motors Acceptance Corporation and General Motors Export Company.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  3. 1927

    General Motors leases offices in its new Broadway building, and the old one becomes the Argonaut Building

    The building stayed General Motors' New York corporate headquarters until 1927, when the company leased about a third of the offices in its new building at 1769-1787 Broadway, cattycorner across the intersection. GM kept the older building for showrooms and divisions including Cadillac, LaSalle, Chevrolet and Frigidaire until the early 1970s. It came to be called the Argonaut Building, a name the report says was undoubtedly meant to tell it apart from the newer one.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  4. 1942

    The Office of War Information sets up offices and broadcast studios in the Argonaut Building

    The U.S. government's Office of War Information, later renamed the Office of Information and Educational Exchange, kept offices and broadcast studios here from 1942 into the early 1950s. By then General Motors was using the building for showrooms and company divisions.

    “From 1942 into the early 1950s, the U.S. Government Office of War Information…”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  5. 1977

    July

    Hearst buys the Argonaut Building, already its tenant, for its magazine division

    The Hearst Corporation had leased offices in General Motors' Argonaut Building by 1975 and bought the property in July 1977. The building housed offices of Hearst Magazines, which by 2000 included Cosmopolitan, Country Living and Popular Mechanics. Earlier tenants of the division there included Avon Books and Science Digest.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  6. 2000

    December 19

    The Landmarks Preservation Commission designates the Demarest and Peerless buildings

    The Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the A.T. Demarest & Company and Peerless Motor Car Company Buildings a city landmark on December 19, 2000, after an October 31 hearing at which four people spoke in favor, including representatives of the owner. The report credits Francis H. Kimball's design with an early, significant use of terra-cotta cladding on tall New York buildings, and notes that the ground-floor showrooms are among the earliest surviving in the city.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  7. 2011

    September

    Open Society Foundations leases all the office space after a LEED Gold renovation

    Gensler's renovation of the building was completed in 2011 and won LEED Gold certification, a rare distinction for a building of its age. In September 2011 George Soros's Open Society Foundations leased all of the office space, and Tirmizi Campbell renovated the interior for the foundation's use, finishing in 2013.

    Source: Wikipedia

Further reading

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All 178 buildings with stories in Midtown