The Harvard Club of New York City

History and architecture

Sitting erect and dignified on West Forty-Fourth Street is this trim and elegant Georgian club house. The charm of this building lies in its red brick with limestone trim and in its intimate scale, the delicate refinement of its handsome detail, and the pleasing harmony of its well related architectural components. The front elevation consists of a handsome motif, where a main entrance doorway at street level is surmounted by a central round hemmed window, flanked by two pairs of limestone Ionic columns which rest on the second floor ledge and support the delicately refined third floor cornice.

Directly above this and centered between two windows is the handsomely carved shield of Harvard University. At the roof line, the stone coping, covering the brick parapet wall, supports a central or owning element composed of a star-studded stone ball flanked by two horizontally placed consoles. To the vest of this three story building, a six story addition was made in 1915.

The Forty-Fifth Street elevation is very interesting and its design is considered by many to be equal in quality to that of the entrance facade. This exterior wall contains three-story round-headed windows set between brick pilasters, which light the great lounge, considered by many architectural historians to be the finest club room in America. At the public hearing, the Chairman of the Historical Buildings Committee of the American Institute of Architects, New York Chapter, said that he read several years ago a brief obituary of an honored Harvard alumnus, in which it was noted that the most significant accomplishment of the deceased, as a member of the building committee at the time the club was built, was that he held out for a period of weeks against the entire committee for the three storied lounge.

He won his point, and today the Harvard Club has a room that has no equal in the City.