21 West 16th Street Building

History and architecture

Located on the north side of West 16th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues, No. 21 West 16th Street is a distinctive Greek Revival rowhouse constructed about 1846, at a time when the Union Square area was developing as a fashionable neighborhood. As the city expanded northward in the 1840s, the area west of Union Square and north of 14th Street, then bordering on the city's northernmost urban limits, became a prosperous neighborhood of mansions and fine rowhouses.

Characteristic of the Greek Revival style, this brick-fronted house, with its elegant design and proportions, is trimmed in finely detailed stone, ironwork, and wood, exemplified by the original wood door enframement with its slender Corinthian pilasters supporting an entablature and transom above and the richly ornamented iron balcony fronting the parlor-story windows.

The eared and battered entrance surround, executed in stone, is a distinguishing architectural feature initially derived from Egyptian sources that was popular in Greek Revival rowhouse designs during the 1840s. This rowhouse is one of at least twelve on this block planned and probably built by speculator and businessman Edward S. Mesier, under a restrictive agreement that determined the appearance and use of the buildings in order to ensure that West 16th Street, like the surrounding neighborhood, develop as a block of fine residences.1 In the late-nineteenth century and early-twentieth century, the area changed in character from residential to one of mixed use, as commercial buildings replaced most of the older rowhouses.

Remarkably intact, No. 21 West 16th Street maintains its simple elegance and serves as a significant reminder of the former residential character of the neighborhood to the west of Union Square.