308 West 89th Street
308 West 89th Street
Date: 1887-89
NB Number: NB 1566-1887
Type: Rowhouse
Architect: Taft, Joseph H.
Developer/Owner/Builder: Squier & Whipple
Row Configuration: placeholder
NYC Landmarks Designation: Historic District
Landmark Designation Report: Riverside Drive- West End Historic District
National Register Designation: N/A
Primary Style: Flemish Revival
Primary Facade: Brownstone
Stories: 4 and basement
Window Type/Material: See detail
Roof Type/Material: Pitched/Slate
Structure: These two houses of four stories plus basements have brownstone fronts. Perceived as a pair, these houses are essentially mirror images of one another. Both buildings are two bays wide, with projecting curved bays rising up to the third story (the eastern bay of No. 308 and the western bay of No. 310). No. 310 retains its stone balustrade atop the bowed bay. The houses’ flush bays are adjacent and feature shallow balconies with wrought iron railings below the third story windows. The slate tiled roofs are sharply pitched. Each building has a large dormer with three windows and an ogee arched metal gable above the bowed bay; a smaller single-window dormer with a metal gable is placed above the flush bay. No. 308 retains the original masonry transom bars in the upper three stories. The original windows probably had single-pane pivoting wood-framed sash below transoms which still exist at the second story of No. 308. Both houses have the original basement grilles.
Historic District: Riverside Drive- West End HD
Alterations: The stoop has been removed and a new entranceway created at the basement story below a light fixture. The original parlor story entrance has been partially filled in and replaced by a small window. The basement story has had a brick veneer applied and the upper stories are painted brown. The windows have a variety of aluminum replacement sash in addition to original sash. The pressed metal dormer gable is painted brown. 1949: Alt 909-1949 [Source: Alteration Application] Stoop removed and building converted from a rooming house to ten apartments. Architect — Richard B. Thomas Owner — Clara Montell
History: Built in 1887-89, these houses are survivors of a row of ten houses designed by Joseph H. Taft and probably built for the major West Side developer, W.E.D. Stokes, although the owners of record are listed as Squier & Whipple. Stokes was responsible for many rows west of Broadway and north of 81st Street, although he frequently had others file his applications at the Department of Buildings. Taft was Stokes’s architect between 1887 and 1890. Squier & Whipple were also noted West Side developers, although this is their only recorded project in the district. The row originally wrapped around the corner of West 89th Street and West End Avenue. Nos. 302 and 306 West 89th Street and 591-599 West End Avenue were demolished in 1922 and 1924 for the erection of three apartment buildings.
Selected References: Frank L. Fisher, The Beautiful West Side: A Complete List of West Side Dwellinqs (New York, c. 1895), 58. New York City Department of Taxes Photograph Collection, Municipal Archives and Record Collection, E 1295. New York Public Library, Photographic Views of New York City 1870’s-1970’s from the Collections of the New York Public Library (Ann Arbor, Mich., 1981), microfiche nos. 0619 El. “West Side Number,!” Real’Estate Record & Guide, Dec. 20, 1890, 53′.