The Sherry-Netherland is a 38-story apartment hotel located at 781 Fifth Avenue on the corner of East 59th Street in the Upper East Side neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It was designed and built by Schultze &amp; Weaver with Buchman &amp; Kahn.The building is 560.01 feet (170.69 m) high, and was noted as the tallest apartment-hotel in New York City when it opened. The site had been occupied since the early 1890s by the Hotel New Netherland, designed by William Hume for William Waldorf Astor, a member of the prominent Astor family. Demolition began in the early winter of 1926, and construction began before the year was out, but the upper floors suffered a spectacular fire when wooden scaffolding caught alight on April 12, 1927 before the building was completed. The fire burned for 12 hours and flames were said to have been visible from Long Island. It ignited a debate in the press concerning the ability of the available technology to put out fires in high-rise buildings.At the time of the hotel's construction, the Vanderbilt mansion, diagonally across Fifth Avenue, was being demolished. High relief carved limestone panels by Karl Bitter from the Vanderbilt's porte-cochere and ornamental frieze roundels from that mansion were installed in the Sherry's classicizing groin-vaulted lobby, where massive marble-veneered pilasters with gilded Italian Renaissance capitals articulate walls paneled in small rectangles, Jacobean-fashion. Because of Prohibition, the Sherry was designed with smaller public restaurant square footage than other pre-war hotels.The building houses 165 apartments that were converted to co-ops in 1954.The Neo-Romanesque/Neo-Gothic roofline with gargoyles disguises the water tower.

The Sherry-Netherland

The original Waldorf–Astoria was built in two stages, as the Waldorf Hotel and the Astoria Hotel, which accounts for its dual name. That original site was situated on Astor family properties along Fifth Avenue, opened in 1893, and designed by Henry J. Hardenbergh. It was demolished in 1929 to make way for the construction of the Empire State Building. &nbsp;Built on the site of the millionaire mansions of the Astor family, two separate, but connected structures– the 13-story iron-framed Waldorf and the later steel-framed 16-story Astoria–were joined to become the Waldorf-Astoria, the world's largest hotel. Illustrating the cycle of Manhattan's rising land values, the great hotel was demolished in 1929 and replaced by the Empire State Building.<a href="https://culturenow.org/people/the-skyscraper-museum?name=The_Skyscraper_Museum">[1]</a>&nbsp;Particularly after its relocation, the Waldorf Astoria gained international renown for its lavish dinner parties and galas, often at the center of political and business conferences and fundraising schemes involving the rich and famous. Particularly after World War II it played a significant role in world politics and the Cold War, culminating in the controversial World Peace Conference of March 1949 at the hotel, whose Stalinism was widely denounced. Conrad Hilton acquired management rights to the hotel on October 12, 1949, and the Hilton Hotels Corporation finally bought the hotel outright in 1972. It underwent a $150 million renovation by Lee Jablin in the 1980s and early 1990s, and in October 2014 it was announced that the Anbang Insurance Group of China had purchased the Waldorf Astoria New York for US$1.95 billion, making it the most expensive hotel ever sold. Anbang then converted the Waldorf's upper-floor hotel rooms into 375 condominiums, closing the hotel for a three-year renovation on March 1, 2017.

The Waldorf Astoria

This world renowned luxury hotel has been a symbol of elegance in New York City since its opening in 1907. It was designed as an adaptation of French Renaissance architecture.A French Renaissance-inspired château-style building, it contains 21 stories and is 251.92 ft (76.79 m) tall. The Plaza Hotel's floors use a European floor-numbering pattern, where floor 1, corresponding to the second story, is directly above the ground floor. The first and second stories of the facade, are clad with rusticated blocks of marble. The fourth through fifteenth stories, are clad with white brick and typically contain rectangular windows. These stories contain terracotta veneers that harmonize with the marble facade below it and the mansard roof above.Frank Lloyd Wright designed many buildings while staying at the Plaza. Many movies and books, such as North by Northwest and Eloise, have featured scenes at the Plaza. Occupants enjoy unbeatable views of Central Park and Fifth Avenue.The corner of Fifth Avenue, Central Park South, and 59th Street was developed with the Plaza, Savoy, and New Netherland hotels during the 1890s; the Savoy would be replaced in 1927 by the Savoy-Plaza Hotel, which itself would be demolished in 1964. All three hotels contributed to Fifth Avenue's importance as an upscale area.

Summer Garden, a&amp;nbsp; seasonal restaurant opens, is to be known later as The Rose Room, which reverts to a space for private functions in 1940  

 Introduced with the hotel&amp;rsquo;s opening in 1907. The Porch was a seasonal outdoor restaurant with only ten tables, patronized by the likes of Diamond Jim Brady and the Prince of Wales. Today&amp;rsquo;s Champagne Bar was beautifully renovated in 2014 and is located adjacent to The Plaza&amp;rsquo;s lobby and Fifth Avenue foyer.  

The leaded glass dome was removed around World War II, reportedly to prevent it from being a beacon during air raids  

Plaza Hotel

An architecture firm established in New York City. The partners were Leonard Schultze and S. Fullerton Weaver. Though best known for their work on luxury hotels, Schultze &amp; Weaver also designed schools, hospitals, residential developments, and office buildings. After Weaver died in 1940 Schultze reorganized the firm under the name Leonard Schultze and Associates.&nbsp;

Schultze & Weaver

Most of the buildings on or near the square were built in the 1920’s and early 1930’s, including the Biltmore Hotel, on the Southwest corner of 5th and Olive. As you stand in Pershing Square, look towards the intersection of 5th and Olive to view this grand historic structure. 

Schultze & Weaver

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