{"id":1376,"date":"2014-06-20T20:45:05","date_gmt":"2014-06-21T00:45:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mindfulwalker.com\/?p=1376"},"modified":"2021-05-04T16:15:08","modified_gmt":"2021-05-04T21:15:08","slug":"a-peek-inside-dazzling-29-broadway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mindfulwalker.com\/wordpress\/explore-new-york\/a-peek-inside-dazzling-29-broadway","title":{"rendered":"A Peek Inside Dazzling 29 Broadway"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s hard to quantify the exuberance of Art Deco. Its energy can make an immobile decorative element feel like it\u2019s about to move. Its images jump off of flat surfaces. Its zigzags, lines, and circles seem to dance. Such is the quality of the lobby of 29 Broadway<\/a>, a lesser-known beauty in New York\u2019s Art Deco universe.<\/p>\n

The architects Sloan and Robertson \u2013 John Sloan and T. Markoe Robertson \u2013 designed this beautiful, quirky-shaped, and wedding-cake setback-topped building near Bowling Green. In a city beset by the Great Depression\u2019s joblessness and economic hard times, the building of 29 Broadway provided good work for construction workers and for the craftsmen who won awards from the New York Building Congress for the skill of their stone-cutting, marble-setting, and other work. (For a look at the exterior and more on the building’s history and the architects, see “The Art Deco Pleasures of 29 Broadway<\/a>” on Mindfulwalker.com.) The 30-story building\u2019s sculpted entrance, bold horizontal bands of black and white, and setbacks give it a soaring quality that taller skyscrapers achieve.<\/p>\n

On a walking tour of some Lower Manhattan buildings that I led for the Jane\u2019s Walk weekend in early May, we concluded the walk at 29 Broadway and were fortunate enough to gain access to the lobby of this 1931 commercial building and look around. It was evident in their snapping of photos and conversations how much those on the walk appreciated the gorgeous interior space of this 83-year-old building. During the prior week as I checked out 29 Broadway to gather some views of it, a building attendant \u2013 who was obviously proud of this space and the way that the building management maintains it \u2013 pointed out various elements of the vestibule and interior. So often, building employees and security attendants in the lobbies of these buildings show them off with pride, as he did. He may as well have been showing off his home.<\/p>\n

The vestibule that leads from Broadway to the interior, with its marble in an alternate pattern of horizontal and vertical lines and a glittering mosaic ceiling, presages the beauty and sleekness of the lobby and first floor. Inside, the walls of slate green, white, and gray Cipollino marble, with their swirling and wavy ribs, are striking. The silver elevator doors have elaborate geometric fan motifs. Art Deco embraced and often evoked technology, travel, and the Machine Age. This was the era of Lindbergh\u2019s transatlantic flight in 1927, ocean liners captivating the public, and transportation progress. The large, gorgeous silver metalwork \u201cLetter Box,\u201d still shiny as new, captures that Deco energy and allure in its images of an ocean liner, locomotive, and airplane. In one image is optimism, even in a period of economic trial and uncertainty. Thankfully, such images and shapes in silver and in stone, still spark our own moods and flights of fancy today. If ever there were a compact piece of the Jazz Age, this jewel of an entrance floor is it.<\/p>\n