Bryant Park Studios
80 West 40th Street | also 1054 Avenue of the Americas | Midtown | built 1901
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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.
- 1901
Charles Rich designs Bryant Park Studios for working artists
Developer Abraham Anderson completes a 10-story Beaux-Arts studio building at 80 West 40th Street, designed by architect Charles A. Rich with forty duplex and simplex units. Large north-facing windows overlooking Bryant Park make the building especially suited to painters and photographers.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1902
Cafe des Beaux Arts opens on the ground floor
The Bustanoby brothers open the Cafe des Beaux Arts on the ground floor and in the basement in 1902, giving the studio building its popular nickname, the Beaux Arts Building. The restaurant, with a women's-only bar and a basement beer hall, becomes a fashionable gathering spot beneath the artists' and photographers' studios above.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1938
A fire destroys artwork inside the studio building
A fire breaks out at 80 West 40th Street on the night of April 3, 1938, spreading from a painter's eighth-floor studio and destroying artwork worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, including tapestries and paintings in developer Abraham Anderson's own apartment. The building remains an artist community afterward, drawing tenants such as painter Fernand Leger by 1941 before later decades bring fashion showrooms and offices instead.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1988
The city landmarks the former Beaux Arts Studios building
New York City designates 80 West 40th Street a landmark on December 13, 1988. A renovation around the same time spends about $4.5 million on facade cleaning, lobby restoration and window repairs, and the building is renovated again in 2008.
Source: Wikipedia
Further reading
- Bryant Park StudiosWikipedia
- The 1901 Beaux Arts Studios -- 80 West 40th StreetDaytonian in Manhattan
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