The Corinthian

330 East 38th Street | also 645 1st Avenue, 347 East 37th Street, 345 East 37th Street | Murray Hill | built 1989

Open on the map12 entries

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

  1. 1953

    The East Side Airlines Terminal opens on the block, the first Manhattan stop for airport buses

    Before the tower, the block between 37th and 38th Streets and First and Second Avenues held the stone, two-story East Side Airlines Terminal, built in 1953. For more than 30 years it was where millions of travelers boarded buses to Kennedy and La Guardia airports. By the 1980s it also held city Transportation Department offices, a 346-car garage, a coffee shop and bubble-covered tennis courts of the Murray Hill Racquet Club on its roof.

    Source: The New York Times

  2. 1985

    February 13

    The terminal site sells at auction for a record $90.6 million

    The Metropolitan Transportation Authority auctioned the terminal block in its vacant waiting room. A joint venture of developer Bernard Spitzer, lawyer Peter Malkin and two private corporations outbid seven rivals, each of whom had posted a $1 million deposit. Bidding began at $55 million and ran 21 rounds over three and a half hours, and the price was believed to be the largest ever paid at auction for Manhattan real estate.

    Source: The New York Times

  3. 1986

    September 12

    A New York Times report details the Corinthian's 863 apartments and their 180-degree views

    A September 1986 Times report described the Corinthian, then under construction on the old East Side Airlines Terminal site, as an 863-apartment condominium built by Bernard Spitzer with Kriti Properties as partner. Rounded facades with semicircular bay windows would give every apartment a 180-degree view, with 17 apartments to a floor. The mix ran from 99 plain studios to 46 three-bedrooms and a single duplex.

    Source: Internet Archive

  4. 1986

    October

    Corinthian sales open with 160 apartments sold in five weeks and a waiting list of 1,200

    Sales began in October 1986, marketed by M. J. Raynes, while the tower was still going up. Buyers purchased 160 units in the first five weeks, and 1,200 more prospects were on a waiting list to see plans. Because of the nearby United Nations, press releases went out in five foreign languages.

    “A total of 160 residential units were purchased within the first five weeks of sales and the firm was still screening 1,200 prospective buyers…”

    Source: Wikipedia

  5. 1988

    Der Scutt's fluted tower rises on the terminal's retained base

    Architect Der Scutt designed the 57-story tower with curved, fluted groups of semicircular bay windows giving every apartment a 180-degree view. Developers had meant to demolish the terminal but kept much of it as the commercial base, adding columns to carry the tower above. It held 863 apartments, more than any other residential building in the city at its opening.

    “The base of the building incorporates much of the former structure of the East Side Airlines Terminal and is used as commercial space.”

    Source: Wikipedia

  6. 1988

    A 27,000-square-foot plaza with a bronze sculpture fronts the tower on First Avenue

    The tower's landscaped residential plaza covers about 26,920 square feet, and a 2000 survey of the city's public spaces called it the largest in New York. A green sloping mound planted with ivy and trees fronts First Avenue, and an amphitheater-shaped water feature with a cascade faces the building. At its center stands Peirene, an abstract bronze by Aristides Demetrios dated 1988.

    Source: apops.mas.org

  7. 1988

    April 29

    The first Corinthian residents move in as Bernard Spitzer calls it one of his most unusual buildings

    The first residents began moving in during the last week of April 1988. About two-thirds of the 863 units had sold since October 1986, with asking prices running between $198,000 for a studio and $750,000 for a three-bedroom. Spitzer said the big terminal site gave him room to build one of the most unusual projects in his 35 years as a developer.

    Source: Internet Archive

  8. 2009

    October

    Eliot Spitzer sells the garage under the Corinthian for $10.275 million

    In the week before October 7, 2009, former governor Eliot Spitzer sold the parking garage beneath the Corinthian, which his father Bernard had built, for $10.275 million. The buyer was Gregg Reuben of Alliance Parking, who partnered with Bert Brodsky and said Spitzer oversaw the sale. Reuben called him a total gentleman.

    Source: commercialobserver.com

  9. 2011

    The Spitzer family sells the Corinthian's office condominiums for $31 million

    In 2011 the Spitzer family sold the office condominiums in the tower's commercial base for $31 million. The offices were later renovated to draw high-end medical practices, a choice tied to the building's closeness to NYU Langone Medical Center.

    “The Spitzer family sold off the building's parking garage in 2009 for $10.3 million and the office condominiums in 2011 for $31 million.”

    Source: Wikipedia

  10. 2013

    December 12

    Pfizer sells its 50th-floor executive suite of 21 bedrooms

    Pfizer bought the 50th floor before the tower opened and used its nearly 16,000 square feet as corporate housing with 21 bedrooms and 25 bathrooms. Then-CEO Edmund Pratt Jr. chose the site after watching the tower go up from his office window. Gaia Real Estate paid $14.6 million for the floor in December 2013 and planned to convert it into 15 condominiums.

    Source: therealdeal.com

  11. 2014

    May 15

    Eliot Spitzer sells 144 of the family's apartments for $147 million

    On May 15, 2014, former governor Eliot Spitzer, who now heads the family business, sold 144 rental apartments in the Corinthian to Gaia Real Estate for $147 million. Gaia already owned units in the 57-story building. Bernard Spitzer had developed the tower after the 1985 auction.

    Source: therealdeal.com

  12. 2020

    January

    Turtle Bay Music School closes 18 months after moving into the tower's base

    The Turtle Bay Music School sold its longtime East 52nd Street townhouse and bought a former radiology office at the Corinthian's base, spending more than $15 million on the new home. Enrollment fell by about a third, and the school closed in January 2020, roughly 18 months after moving in. Its 50 teachers were let go.

    Source: The New York Times

Further reading

Nearby

All 26 buildings with stories in Murray Hill