User:Epicgenius/sandbox/draft18


 * 154 West 14th Street/156 West 14th Street/158 West 14th Street/160 West 14th Street
 * http://s-media.nyc.gov/agencies/lpc/lp/2419.pdf
 * ("154 West 14th" or "154 W. 14th" or "154 West Fourteenth" or "154 W. Fourteenth" or "156 West 14th" or "156 W. 14th" or "156 West Fourteenth" or "156 W. Fourteenth" or "158 West 14th" or "158 W. 14th" or "158 West Fourteenth" or "158 W. Fourteenth" or "160 West 14th" or "160 W. 14th" or "160 West Fourteenth" or "160 W. Fourteenth") and ("Manhattan" or "New York") Not ("Classified Ad" or "Display Ad" or "Spare Times")



Site
154 West 14th Street is located on the southeast corner of 14th Street and Seventh Avenue in the Chelsea and Greenwich Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. The land lot covers 11,766 ft2 and is rectangular, with frontage of 100 ft on 14th Street and 117.67 ft on Seventh Avenue. 154 West 14th Street shares the block with 144 West 14th Street (the Pratt Institute School of Information) and the Salvation Army Headquarters to the east. In addition, entrances to the New York City Subway's 14th Street/Sixth Avenue station are just outside the building.

The surrounding stretch of 14th Street, which opened in 1828 from the Hudson River as far east as the Bowery (now Fourth Avenue), was largely residential during much of the 19th century. By the 1890s, the adjacent section of 14th Street had become largely commercial, in part because of the presence of the Sixth Avenue elevated line and streetcar routes. The adjacent section of Seventh Avenue was extended south through Greenwich Village in the 1910s as part of the construction of the New York City Subway's IRT Broadway–Seventh Avenue Line. Following the construction of Seventh Avenue's southward extension, large hotels and commercial lofts were built along the avenue.

Facade
The facade was intended to allow as much natural light into the building as possible; accordingly, the building was not designed with a heavy cornice below its roof, as was common on older buildings. The main entrance is on 14th Street, while the rest of the ground story contained stores.

Features
When 154 West 14th Street was built, it was supposed to have a driveway from Seventh Avenue, which led to a courtyard with a shipping platform and two freight elevators.

Development
The Adams Express Company announced in March 1908 that it had acquired a site at the southeast corner of 14th Street and Seventh Avenue, following speculation about plans for the site. During the preceding several months, various companies had assembled the site on Adams Express's behalf, buying six land lots in total. Adams Express initially planned to build a small structure that housed its offices. The company said in late 1910 that it still planned to build a structure on the site, despite reports that it was negotiating to sell off the parcels, which still had not been developed. Adams Express finally decided to sell the plot in December 1911 to the Fourteenth Street and Seventh Avenue Company for $260,000. The latter company's president, Leslie R. Palmer, planned to build a 12-story loft structure on the site. At the time, the site was "one of the choicest parcels on the lower end of [Seventh] Avenue", according to The New York Times. After buying the site, Palmer announced plans to spend $410,000 on a 12-story speculative commercial development on the site, and he hired Herman Lee Meader to design a loft building. Palmer believed that the adjacent stretch of Seventh Avenue was "one of the best located thoroughfares in New York City", because of its proximity to both the under-construction subway and to nearby freight terminals. In February 1912, Meader submitted plans for a 12-story loft building on the site, which was to cost $250,060.