171 East 73rd Street Building

History and architecture

The 171 East 73rd Street Building is one of only two surviving Italianate style rowhouses on East 73rd Street between Lexington and Third Avenues. The house was originally one of a row of six modest brick houses constructed in 1860 for E. H. Robbins. Although most of its original ornament remains, the house has been altered by the addition of a vestibule and garden wall, designed in 1924 by the owner of the house, architect Electus D. Litchfield.

Along with the house at 175 East 73rd Street, No. 171 is the oldest component of the group of low-rise buildings that lines this street. In the early 1860s a number of streets on the Upper East Side were developed with modest rowhouses that were sold to lower-middle-class and working-class families. These rows were among the earliest buildings on the Upper East Side and they predate the large scale development of the area. In the last years of the 19th century the rowhouses that had been built between Fifth and Park Avenues to house middle-class families began to be replaced by mansions built by the city's wealthiest residents.

Although the streets east of Park Avenue were still not seen as being desirable for large residences, they were directly affected by the new development near Central Park. The small rowhouses that lined the side streets east of Park Avenue began to be replaced by private carriage houses and stables built to serve the wealthy families who lived nearby.

With the exception of the addition of wall air conditioners, the house remains much as Litchfield left it. This modest rowhouse maintains a major position in the center of an unusual group of buildings on the east side of Manhattan.