makeflatpaw

A superb example of Beaux Arts architecture - the Alexander Hamilton US Custom House at the southern tip of Manhattan - has had exterior and ceremonial interior spaces restored and/or conserved while old office space was renovated for modern use.

Restoration and conservation included cleaning the building's Bowling Green facade and cleaning and/or conserving interior murals, decorative paintings, woodwork, metalwork, and marble. Renovations adapted space for Federal courtrooms and ancillary offices, for offices for future tenants, for meeting rooms, and for a 350 seat auditorium with state of-the art projection facilities. Upgrades of fire-safety, security, telecommunications, and heating, air conditioning, and ventilating systems accompanied alterations.

Preservation of the Custom House has attracted much public attention. The building is on the National Register of Historic Places, and it was one of the earliest designations of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission for both exterior and public interior spaces.

The Custom House was designed by the prominent architect Cass Gilbert and constructed between 1902 and 1907. It incorporates Beaux Arts and City Beautiful Movement planning principles and combinations of architecture, engineering, and fine arts. Lavish sculptures, paintings, and decorations by well-known artists of the time, such as Daniel Chester French, embellish the facade, the two-story entry portico, the main hall parallel to the facade, the Rotunda, and the Collector's Reception Room.

The preservation of this fine art was accomplished by an unusual series of subcontracts. Preliminary investigations revealed that much artwork had been executed in unique materials and complex applications, some of which had deteriorated over time. Thus, careful research was necessary before restoration could even begin. (For example, murals painted by Regional Marsh in the Rotunda were on a special sand-rich plaster too delicate to be cleaned and requiring conservation treatments.) Selected fine arts conservators bid on restoring particular works. Each conservator surveyed his task, recommended materials and methods, tested the approach, and completed the job under the eye of recognized experts. Each step of restoration was documented, and copies of the compiled research were given to the U.S. General Services Administration and to the National Archives.
Daniel Chester French

For much of its history, New York City has been the most significant port city in the United States of America. Before a federal income tax was imposed in 1916, a primary source of revenue for the federal government was custom duty. With New York City the country's most active port, New York has had a Custom House since the country's founding in in 1781.

In 1899, the United States Department of the Treasury sponsored a competition to build a new U.S. Custom House on a site in Manhattan known as "Bowling Green." This was the site where, in 1626, a group of Dutch settlers "bought" Mahnattan Island from Indians for about $24.00 worth of beads. The competition was won by Cass Gilbert (1859-1934) who hailed from St. Paul, Minnesota. His magnificent Beaux Arts building not only contained the rooms necessary for collection of Custom tariffs, but was designed to show the greatness and grandeur of the United States.

The seven story structure contains 450,000 square feet of space and sits on three city blocks. It was richly decorated inside and out, including dozens of sculptures and carved images which grace the exterior of the building. Construction of the Custom House was begun in 1900 and it was completed in 1907. The building was subsequently abandoned in the 1970's and was scheduled for demolition before being saved and restored in the early 1980's. In 1987, the United States Bancruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York occupied the building and in 1994, the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of the American Indian took over two floors of the Old Custom House.

Today, the Custom House is surrounded by a crowded grouping of office buildings in lower Manhattan, not far from the site on which the twin towers of the World Trade Center once stood.

Central to Gilbert's design of the Custom House were four separate sculptures to be placed at the front entrance of the Custom House, representing four continents (from left to right) - Asia, America, Europe and Africa. Gilbert asked both Daniel Chester French and August Saint-Gaudens both to submit designs for the scupltures. Saint-Gaudens declined the invitation, citing other work he was occupied with, so French received the commission.

French began designing the sculptures of "Continents" in 1903 and they were completed and installed in 1907 .

Art scholars consider French's "Continents" to be perhaps the best examples of architecture sculpture in the United States. Each of the four "Continents" are rich in imagry

The view from the spot where I spend approximately 23.8% of my week.

I actually cleaned up a bit for this picture, but you can't see the chaos on my desk to the right of the phone, where there are ridiculous piles of spreadsheets and maps and brochures and a stack of about 30 CDs that's threatening to tip over.

You also can't see the other four music/show posters in my cube, along with eight additional plants, five Steve Keene paintings, five framed postcards, two calendars, an end table covered with a collection of bath & body works lotions, a tower of london snowglobe, a picture of my parents in a frame my mom decorated with sand, a sandcastle, an armadillo, an otter, and you know... a bunch of other crap.

What? I used to have a big office before I moved to this building... and I didn't want to take this stuff home.

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