58 Avenue A; 58-72 Avenue A | Block : 400 | Lot #1

Description & Building Alterations

This large building, which stretches from East 4th Street to East 5th Street, replaced as many as 10 tenement buildings in 1935.  Its facade is unadorned but for a few projecting brick details surrounding some windows.  The parapet has been repaired, obscuring whatever details might have been there. In historic photos from the early 1940s, however, it does not appear that there was any detail.  The building most likely would not have had a metal cornice, but there could have been brickwork laid in a pattern.

The complex is built in an E-shaped plan and was designed to house 76 families and 10 stores.  It was part of a larger urban revitalization that was going on in the neighborhood in the mid-1930s that replaced old tenements with new apartments.  With tenement laws changing at this time, it was easy to condemn the outmoded buildings and build anew. Originally comprising of eight lots, of which Lots 1, 3, 4 and 7 were part of William B. Astor’s holdings and were leased out to various people between 1850-1875.