157 East 78th Street House

History and architecture

There is a charm and sparkle in the appearance of this four-story red brick house with painted stone trim at 157 East 78th Street* Standing next to two other similar row houses and sharing a party wall with its easterly neighbor, this residence and its adjacent dwellings were built from one set of architectural drawings and specifications in 1861, They are in the vernacular of the period and reveal an Italianate influence in the style of the windows and especially in the modillions end ornate brackets of the cornice, crowning the residence. In uniformity of size and quality of design, this House and its adjoining neighbors to the East add color, character and dignity to Seventy-eighth Street.

A narrow areaway two steps down from the sidewalk separates the building from the property line. The recessed paneled entrance door on the ground floor is enframed by an arched and gabled brick entranceway slightly Gothic in character. At the second floor level a stone bend course, which continues on into the two adjacent houses serves as a sill for the floor length French door at this level. The plain lintels of the first and second floor and the cap- molded lintels of the third floor windows arc identical in the three houses as is the impressive cornice which adorns this residence at the roof line. At a later date a fourth floor was added, having a slate-covered Mansard roof with throe pedimented dormer windows which complements the residence.

John Turner, painter, purchased the three lots at 157, 159 and 161 East 78th Street in 1860 for $500 apiece. The houses were constructed by Henry Armstrong, a builder, who erected eleven houses on this street. In the tax assessment book for 1861, the owners were listed as Turner & Armstrong and the house was assessed for $1,800. Number 157 was bought in 1863 by Henry Shaw for $6,000, and the conveyance carried the notation that "Easterly wall of house on said lot being party wall."