Woolworth Building
233 Broadway | also 6 Park Place, 2 Park Place, 20 Park Place | Tribeca | built 1913
Open on the map22 entries
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1910
Woolworth tells Cass Gilbert to raise the tower to 620 feet so it will top the Singer Building
In November 1910 Cass Gilbert's notes record that Frank Woolworth asked how his tower compared in height with the Singer Building's, then had it raised to 620 feet above the sidewalk. Woolworth later explained that people he met in Europe kept asking about the Singer tower, which gave him the idea of building something that would advertise his five-and-ten-cent stores across the world. The design was announced that month as a 45-story, 625-foot tower.
“…comparative height with the Singer tower and instructed me to increase the height so as to make it 620 ft. above the sidewalk…”
- 1910
Woolworth has the Metropolitan Life tower measured and orders his own fifty feet taller
Even at 625 feet, the Woolworth tower would not be the world's tallest, because the Metropolitan Life tower had taken that title in 1909. In late December 1910 a civil engineer measured the Metropolitan at 700 feet and 2 inches. Asked by Gilbert how high he wanted the new tower, Woolworth ordered one rising fifty feet above its rival. He then bought the rest of the Broadway frontage between Park Place and Barclay Street to fit the larger building.
- 1910
Woolworth offers to back a bank merger if the bank moves into his planned tower
In 1910 Irving National Bank president Lewis Pierson, a friend of Woolworth, was struggling to engineer a merger with the New York Exchange Bank against resistance from several bankers. Woolworth offered to buy the extra shares needed to make the consolidation succeed if the combined bank would take its headquarters in his proposed building on Broadway. With the banks on board, Woolworth acquired a corner lot at Broadway and Park Place and hired Cass Gilbert to design the building.
“…the additional stock necessary to make the consolidation of the two banks a success if the bank would move up to Broadway…”
- 1910
Wrecking crews demolish the five- and six-story buildings on the Broadway site
In September 1910 wrecking crews tore down the five- and six-story structures that stood on the site. Excavation began on November 4, 1910, by the Foundation Company under a contract Frank Woolworth negotiated personally. Worth over $1 million, the deal was called the largest foundation contract ever awarded anywhere, and starting work lifted the site's value from about $2.25 million to $3.2 million.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1912
Steelworkers set a speed record raising the Woolworth frame
Steelworkers set a record by putting up 1,153 tons of steel over six straight eight-hour shifts. The frame rose about a story and a half a week, reaching the 18th floor by February 18, 1912, and the top of the 30-story base by April 6, when work began on the tower itself. By May 30 the steel had reached the 47th floor.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1912
Workers top out the Woolworth Building's tower
Ironworkers drive the tower's last rivet into place, completing the steel frame less than two years after excavation began on Broadway. Cass Gilbert's Neo-Gothic design tops out at 792 feet, putting the building on track to open the following spring as the world's tallest.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1913
Cass Gilbert carves the building's makers into the lobby, with Woolworth holding a bag of nickels
Beneath the cornice of the Woolworth Building's marble lobby, quarried on the Greek island of Skyros, Gilbert placed playful portraits of the people behind the project. The architect holds a model of the building, Woolworth carries a bag of nickels and engineer Aus holds a steel beam. Rental agent Hogan, builder Louis Horowitz and banker Lewis Pierson are shown as well.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1913
The new Woolworth Building opens with a frescoed restaurant, barber shop, Turkish bath and pool below
Beneath the offices, the 1913 Woolworth Building held a basement full of amenities. The Postkeller was a restaurant where patrons dined under frescoed, vaulted ceilings, and the same level held a huge barber shop, a Turkish bath and a swimming pool. Above them, the first floor housed the Irving National Bank and the Broadway Trust Company, while some 12,000 workers came and went each day.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1913
Tenants who buy outside drinking water are forbidden to carry the bottles in the elevators
About two months after the Woolworth Building opened, a messy lawsuit was filed over water. The managers, the Broadway-Park Place Company, had given the Virginia Bear Water Company a monopoly on supplying drinking water to tenants. Tenants such as the Friesdedt Underpinning Company who bought from the Pine Hill Crystal Spring Company instead could not use the elevators for the five-gallon bottles, so office workers hauled them up anywhere from two to thirty-seven flights of stairs.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1913
Critic Montgomery Schuyler writes the text of a 56-page brochure hailing the tower
When the tower opened, Woolworth had a 56-page brochure privately printed with text by the architecture critic Montgomery Schuyler. Schuyler called the newest and tallest skyscraper shapely and proportionate as well as towering, a gracious and commanding peak in the jagged skyline of Lower Manhattan. A Japanese architect, Matsunosuke Moriyama, was quoted in the New York Times saying that more buildings like it would change the world's opinion of American architecture.
“…wrote the text for a 56-page brochure on the building printed privately by Woolworth…”
- 1913
President Wilson lights the Woolworth Building from Washington
The five-and-dime magnate Frank W. Woolworth spent $13.5 million on his headquarters, designed by Cass Gilbert in a Neo-Gothic style. On April 24, 1913, President Woodrow Wilson switched on the building's lights remotely from Washington. At 792 feet it was the tallest building in the world until 1929, when 40 Wall Street and the Chrysler Building passed it.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1914
Nikola Tesla takes an office in the Woolworth Building and is evicted a year later
The inventor Nikola Tesla rented an office in the Woolworth Building in 1914 but was evicted a year later, unable to pay the rent. The tower also housed railroad ticket offices, the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company and, from 1915, Scientific American magazine.
“…occupied an office in the Woolworth Building beginning in 1914; he was evicted after a year because he could not pay his rent…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 1916
The Reverend S. Parkes Cadman dubs the tower the Cathedral of Commerce
In a 1916 publication the Reverend S. Parkes Cadman called the Woolworth Building the Cathedral of Commerce, a name that stuck. The Gothic theme carries into the lobby, where small carved figures include Frank Woolworth holding nickels and dimes and the engineer Gunvald Aus measuring a girder. The city designated the building a landmark in 1983.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1924
The Woolworth Company completes its purchase of the tower
The Broadway-Park Place Corporation finalizes the sale of its remaining shares to Woolco Realty, a subsidiary of the F.W. Woolworth Company. The five-and-dime chain that had built the skyscraper eleven years earlier becomes its sole owner, ending a period of shared ownership with outside investors.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1931
The Society of Arts and Sciences gives Cass Gilbert its gold medal for the Woolworth Building
Cass Gilbert was awarded the Society of Arts and Sciences' gold medal on January 16, 1931, for the design of the Woolworth Building. At the dinner he was hailed as a prophet of a new movement in architecture. Society president Walter Russell, an artist, said Gilbert had ended the dominance of the horizontal line and put the upward pull of the vertical in its place.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1941
The observation deck closes as a wartime security measure
Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, building management closes the Woolworth Building's public observation deck near the top of the tower as a precaution against sabotage. The deck had drawn sightseers up the tower since the building's earliest years.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1970
The company's lawyer calls the landmark law onerous at a hearing on the Woolworth Building
The Landmarks Preservation Commission held a hearing on designating the Woolworth Building in April 1970. The company's lawyer, Kenneth W. Greenawait, opposed the proposal, calling the landmark law onerous and discriminatory and saying the owner would be deprived of rights of possession without compensation. The building was not designated until 1983.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1977
The Woolworth Company begins restoring the weathered terra cotta and replaces every window
In 1977 the F. W. Woolworth Company began restoring the badly weathered terra cotta cladding. A detailed inspection found no structural problems, only damage to the facade. All 4,400 windows were replaced with energy-efficient aluminum copies, and many terra cotta pieces, upwards of a third of the original material, were duplicated in cast stone and fiberglass.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1983
The city designates the Woolworth Building a landmark after three hearings
On April 12, 1983, the Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the Woolworth Building a city landmark, after hearings on February 9, April 13 and June 8, 1982. Six witnesses spoke in favor and two against. The commission's report called the tower a turning point for the American skyscraper and the model for the tall romantic skyscrapers of the post-World War I building boom.
- 2001
The Woolworth Building loses power and water for weeks after the attacks a few blocks away
The destruction of the World Trade Center a few blocks away left the Woolworth Building with no power, water or phone service for several weeks. Windows were shattered, and falling debris damaged a turret near the top. Security tightened afterward, most of the ornate lobby was closed to the public, and the Park Place subway entrance was shut. Public tours of the lobby resumed in 2014.
“…the Woolworth Building was without electricity, water and telephone service for a few weeks…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 2004
The Woolworth Tower Kitchen restaurant opens on the ground floor
Restaurateur Sharif Adlouni opens an upscale American restaurant in the tower's ground-floor storefront, taking over a space that had housed the Coffee Mug until 1998. A veteran of the business for 35 years, Adlouni is betting on new foot traffic from the developing World Trade Center memorial nearby.
Source: Internet Archive
- 2012
Work begins turning the top 30 floors into apartments
The Woolworth company sold the building in 1998 to the Witkoff Group. Beginning in 2012, its top 30 floors were converted to residences, while the lower floors stayed in use as offices and shops. The building remains one of the 100 tallest in the United States.
Source: Wikipedia
Further reading
- Woolworth BuildingWikipedia
- Woolworth BuildingPlace Matters
- Woolworth Tower KitchenPlace Matters
- The dazzling beauty of New York autochromesEphemeral New York
- The East River waterfront, 1906Ephemeral New York
- Building the “Cathedral of Commerce”Ephemeral New York
Nearby
- Transportation Building225 Broadway | 6 entries
- Barclay Tower10 Barclay Street | 3 entries
- Four Seasons Hotel New York Downtown99 Church Street | 12 entries
- New York County Lawyers' Association Building14 Vesey Street | 4 entries
- 23 Park Place Building23 Park Place | 5 entries
- St. Peter's Church22 Barclay Street | 12 entries