Carter's Review

The 16-story apartment building at 1200 Fifth Avenue on the northeast corner at 101st Street was erected in 1928 and designed by Emery Roth, the architect of such major residential skyscrapers as the San Remo and the Beresford, both on Central Park West, and 870, 880, 993 and 1125 Fifth Avenue.

The building, which was developed by Joseph Ravitch, originally had rental apartments and was sold in 2004 by the Mount Sinai Medical Center of Joseph Chetrit, Lloyd Goldman, Mann Realty and Joseph Nakash for about $61 million and they converted it to 63 condominium apartments.

About half of the apartments at the time of the sale were occupied by tenants covered by rent control and rent stabilization. By mid-2006, about a third of the units had been sold with prices for studio units starting at about $760,000, two- and three-bedroom apartments with prices between about $1,400,000 and $4,700,000 and five-and six-bedroom units with prices starting at about $5,500,000. A 10-room penthouse was priced at about $14,500,000 in mid-2006 while a lower-floor 10-room apartment with 3,708 square feet was priced at about $6,634,640.

Bottom Line

A very elegant, pre-war building with impressive apartment layouts designed by Emery Roth just to the north of the Mount Sinai Medical Center and close to the Museum of the City of New York and Central Park’s Conservancy Gardens.

Description

The building has a two-story, rusticated limestone base with a three-story, limestone entrance surround topped with an ornate  pediment on the third floor over a broken pediment on the second floor with first-story pilasters decorated with angels.

The building has a 1-step-up, entrance with a very attractive, curved glass marquee flanked by hanging lanterns that lead to a rusticated polished marble vestibule and a large lobby with stained glass windows and a fireplace.

The light, beige-brick building has rusticated masonry quoins, inconsistent fenestration, some protruding air-conditioners, lush sidewalk landscaping, and an attractive, enclosed, rooftop watertank.

The building has a setback at the 16th floor highlighted by delicate iron fencing and there are attractive window surrounds on the 14th and 15th floors.

In his fine book, “Mansions in the Clouds, The Skyscraper Palazzi of Emery Roth,” Steven Ruttenbaum describes this building’s architecture as “robust, Baroque classicism.”

The conversion replaced windows with tilt-and-turn windows.

Amenities

The building has a concierge, a private fitness center, individual storage, a refurbished lobby with refrigerated storage, and bicycle storage.

Apartments

Apartments have 9-and-a-half-foot-high ceilings, decorative electric fireplaces and windowed kitchens with appliances by Wolf, Miele and Sub-Zero and washers and dryers and windowed bathrooms with fixtures by Waterworks, Porcher, Kallista and Toto and heated limestone floors.

Kitchens also have 46-bottle wine coolers.

Apartment 9C/10S is a duplex, 6-bedroom unit with a 22-foot-wide entrance gallery leading to a  42-foot-wide, living/dining/library that is adjacent to an eat-in, 28-foot-long, enclosed kitchen on the upper level with a 25-foot-long family room, an 11-foot-lng staff room and two bedrooms on the lower level.

Apartment 14N is a five-bedroom unit with an 18-foot-wide entry foyer that leads to a 24-foot-long living room that opens onto an enclosed, 22-foot-long dining room that is next to a10-foot-long pantry and a 19-foot-long kitchen.  The apartment also has a 14-foot-long library and a 12-foot-long maid’s room.

Apartment 14A is a three-bedroom unit with a 17-foot-wide entry foyer that lees to a 23-foot-long living room that opens onto a 23-foot-long dining room next to a 10-foot-long pantry, a  19-foot-long kitchen and a 12-foot-long maid’s room.

Apartment D is a two-bedroom unit with a 10-foot-long entry foyer that leads to a 23-foot-long living room with a fireplace adjacent to a 15-foot-long kitchen.

Location

The building is just to the north of the famous medical center, which had owned the rental apartment building for about three decades.

The building is across 101st Street from the angled, I. M. Pei-designed, Guggenheim Pavilion of Mt. Sinai Hospital and it is two blocks south of the Museum of the City of New York. It is about a block north of a playground in Central Park and about three blocks south of the park’s lovely Conservancy Gardens.

The neighborhood has been described as “Upper Fifth Avenue,” “Upper Carnegie Hill” and “Museum Mile North.”