Ritz Tower

History and architecture

The Ritz Tower Apartment Hotel was constructed in 1925 at the premier crossroads of New York's Upper East Side, the corner of 57th Street and Park Avenue, where the exclusive shops and artistic enterprises of 57th Street met apartment buildings of ever-increasing height and luxury on Park Avenue. Designed by the inventive and prolific architect Emery Roth, who was responsible for many luxury apartment buildings throughout Manhattan, the Ritz Tower was intended to be the ne plus ultra of apartment living. Thomas Hastings, the surviving partner of the prominent architectural firm of Carrere & Hastings helped to create the classically-inspired design.

The developer, journalist Arthur Brisbane, hoped to increase the building's appeal by hiring the Ritz-Carlton Company to manage the building and its restaurants, as well as by lending use of its famous name. Constructed as an apartment hotel, with rooms for transients as well as long-term residents, the building provided food service from central kitchens via dumb waiters serving pantries on each floor. The absence of individual kitchens allowed the developer to increase the height of the building since it was then not subject to the height regulations that applied to standard apartment buildings. At the time of its construction, the Ritz Tower was the tallest residential building in New York, with panoramic views in all directions. The lower floors, which are more easily visible from the street, are enriched by highly sculptural ornament, including putti, urns and rusticated stone.

Each setback of the tower is marked by pilasters, pediments and balustrades and is highlighted by large stone fleches which carry the viewer's eye upward along the buildings's height. The tower, crowned by a pyramidal roof with a tall obelisk, further increases the sense of height which was such an important factor when the building was constructed. Throughout its history, the Ritz Tower has been home to wealthy and well-known residents, as well as famous commercial enterprises, including William Randolph Hearst and Marion Davies, Charles of the Ritz House of Beauty, and Le Pavilion, one of America's first authentic, and most influential French restaurants.