They don't build 'em like they used to

I loved the place.

From minute ONE.

I met David out front. He know what he was doing. How could I not fall in love with the street and the building?

It's a very handsome pre-War structure, stately, solid, on a street in a well-known enclave of a neighborhood near the East River. There's lots of Old Money in them thar parts. I kept saying to myself, "I'M actually gonna live HERE??" It was too good to be true. But there it was, my little meeskite mess of an apartment, a true ugly ducking if ever there was one, just waiting to transform into the swan I knew it could be. 

The building sits astride a corner where two big thoroughfares meet. The first thing you notice is that there's a drive-thru entranceway with revolving doors that enter onto a circular lobby. (You have to wonder why more Manhattan buildings didn't copy this idea.)

The entranceway that allows drop-offs for cars and taxis.

The lobby then stretches straight back into the building with the elevators to the right on the first floor and there's a gas fireplace(!) that greets you before you ride upstairs.

The lobby. Elevators are at the back to the right.

I did some research.
The building was designed by the famous architect Emery Roth. He created many of the definitive NYC hotels and apartment buildings of the 1920s and 1930s, most of them incorporating Beaux-Arts and Art Deco details. To name a few, the San Remo, The Beresford, The El Dorado, and many more, all shaping the New York skyline in the first part of the 20th Century.

So that was just the outside. 

We next went upstairs to see my future home...