Bank of the Manhattan Company Building
29-27 Queens Plaza North | also 29-39 Northern Boulevard | Dutch Kills | built 1927
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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.
- 1920
The Manhattan Company merges with the Bank of Long Island, gaining its branch on this site
The Manhattan Company, founded in 1799 and originally based at 40 Wall Street, bought a minority stake in the Bank of Long Island in 1910 and merged with it ten years later. At the time of the merger the company had 13 Queens locations, among them a two-story office at 5 Skillman Place. That smaller building on this site was later demolished for the bank's Long Island City tower.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1925
The Manhattan Company files plans for a 14-story bank and office tower on Queens Plaza
In October 1925 the bank announced plans filed with the Queens Bureau of Buildings for an eleven-story bank and office building crowned by a three-story clock tower. The New York Times put the lot at 60 by 100 feet, though a 1928 atlas shows a 50-by-110-foot footprint. Charles T. Wills, Inc. was hired as the builder.
- 1925
Queens-born architect Morrell Smith designs the bank's Queens Plaza tower
Morrell Smith (1875-1947), born in Queens and an 1893 graduate of Brooklyn's Pratt Institute, designed the building. He worked for the Manhattan Company for years and by 1930 was called the bank's architect, designing its Jamaica Avenue headquarters, branches in Jackson Heights, Far Rockaway and Brooklyn, and a similar 12-story office on East 149th Street in the Bronx.
“This Queens-born designer trained at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, where he graduated in 1893.”
- 1927
The bank dedicates its $1 million tower, hailed as the first skyscraper in Queens
Dedicated in May 1927, the building was billed as Queens' first skyscraper and reportedly put more rentable space on the market than any other in the borough. It opened 85 percent leased, largely to firms new to Queens, while the bank kept the ground floor, the mezzanine and basement vaults. A large lettered sign facing east on the roof advertised the bank.
- 1927
A four-faced clock tower crowns the bank on Queens Plaza
The three-story tower carries four glass clock faces with Roman numerals, non-winding Telechron movements supplied by Brooklyn's Electime Company. Above each XII is a cast-stone relief of a medieval helmet over a plaque and garland. Before construction the Brooklyn Daily Eagle predicted the clock would be visible across Queens and from Manhattan, and it was the second clock tower on the plaza's north side, after the Brewster Building's of about 1911.
- 1928
The Queens Chamber of Commerce names the tower the best business building of 1927
In January 1928 the Queens Chamber of Commerce gave Morrell Smith's building its first prize for the borough's best business building of the previous year. The same year a rear addition reaching about ten feet behind the building was completed; a larger extension to the north and east followed in 1931 or 1933.
“…it received a first prize award from the Queens Chamber of Commerce for the best business building of 1927.”
- 1984
Chase Manhattan closes its Long Island City branch in the tower
After the bank was renamed Chase Manhattan, the ground floor was modernized, possibly in the mid-1960s: the gridded windows, central portico and bronze Oceanus relief gave way to recessed glass doors. The branch shut in 1984, and four years later, in 1988, the building changed hands. The rooftop sign and its framework came down after the sale, by 2004 at the latest.
“The bank's Long Island City branch closed in 1984 and the building was sold in 1988.”
- 2013
The Center for Holographic Arts moves into the empty bank tower
The building sat empty after the branch closed until 2012, when its basement vaults and clock tower were briefly used for site-specific art. Then, over nine months spanning 2013 and 2014, it housed the Center for Holographic Arts.
Source: Wikipedia
- 2015
The city landmarks the bank building after a petition and some 100 letters of support
At the April 21, 2015 hearing six people spoke in favor, including representatives of the owner and the Historic Districts Council, and nobody spoke against. The commission also received about 100 letters, including from Borough President Melinda Katz and Councilmember Jimmy Van Bramer, and a petition with nearly 1,600 signatures. It designated the building a landmark on May 12, 2015.
- 2018
Durst unveils a 63-story tower designed to curve around the old bank
The Durst Organization bought the site in 2016 for $175 million, and in April 2018 announced a 710-foot, 63-story residential tower that wraps around the bank at its base. The finished development, named Sven, turned the former bank into its retail base of more than 50,000 square feet, and the developers planned to restore the four clocks.
Source: Wikipedia
Further reading
- Chase Manhattan Bank BuildingWikipedia
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