Tom Miller, Daytonian in Manhattan.
On June 23, 1909 The New York World reported, “The largest apartment house in the world is being built on a site covering the entire block bounded by Eighty-sixth and Eighth-seventh streets, Broadway and Amsterdam avenue…It will be known as the Belnord. It will house a community as large as that of many a town.”
The Belnord was rising at a time when many affluent families were giving up private homes for the conveniences of sumptuous apartments. On August 1, 1908 the Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide noted that The Belnord would not only be the largest, but “one of the highest grade apartment houses in the world.” The Belnord Realty Company had hired the architectural firm of Hiss & Weekes to design the leviathan structure that the New York World said “will contain 175 apartments, with 2,080 rooms, and the number of occupants, including servants will be 1,225.”
Completed in 1909, the 12-story brick and Indiana limestone Belnord was designed in the Italian Renaissance style. Notable was the large, landscaped courtyard, accessed by two arched carriage entrances on 86th Street (one for incoming and the other for outgoing vehicles), and a “footway entrance” on Broadway. Residents were not subject to public view in alighting from their carriages or cars. “All the entrances to the building proper open into the garden court,” said an advertisement. There were four entrances in the courtyard, one at each corner.
Read the full article in Daytonian in Manhattan.
