Image: B. Altman Building CUNY Graduate Center 34th Street entrance

Description: The B. Altman & Company Building at 351-57 Fifth Avenue from East 34th to 35th Streets, through to 188-89 Madison Avenue, was built in stages from 1906-1913, designed by Trowbridge & Livingston in Italian Renaissance style. Altman's was the first big department store to make the move from the "Ladies' Mile" shopping district, where the dry goods emporia had been located, to Fifth Avenue. The neighborhood was still primarily residential at the time, and the design of the new building was planned to fit in with the palatial mansions around it. Following Altman's example, the other big stores followed and made the move uptown as well. The store close in 1989, and was vacant until 1996, when the exterior was restored by Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer and the interior reconfigured by Gwathmey Siegel & Associates for the City University of New York Graduate Center on the Fifth Avenue side, the New York Public Library's the Science, Industry and Business Library on the Madison Avenue sie, and the Oxford University Press. (Source: AIA Guide to NYC (4th ed.) and Guide to NYC Landmarks (4th ed.))
Title: B. Altman Building CUNY Graduate Center 34th Street entrance
Credit: Own work
Author: Beyond My Ken
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