It’s 1935, and you’re a New Yorker who needs a new apartment. The Depression is still raging, but your fortunes are on the upswing, and you’re thinking luxurious digs in Midtown or on the East or West Sides near Central Park.
Looks like you’ve got lots of options. The July 27, 1935 New Yorker (selling for 15 cents!) contains many classy apartment ads toward the back pages. These are the most amenity-packed ads for buildings that still exist and are still quite luxe.
The “most distinguished address in America” is quite a claim, but One Fifth Avenue beside the Washington Arch at Washington Square Park is still a beautiful building. This Art Deco gem was built in 1927.
I’m not sure the Parc Vendome of today still has a swimming pool. But it is an impressive fortress of a building fronting West 57th Street. (And the phone exchange: Circle for Columbus Circle?)
The El Dorado continues to shine on Central Park West, its two towers as impressive as other iconic West Side buildings like the Dakota and the San Remo.
Ten Park Avenue at 34th Street might not sound spectacular. But in the 1930s, this building maintained the hotel-style feel of many early apartment houses. Room service is available, and this one-bedroom pad is only $1300…per year, I believe.
“The trend is toward the river,” proclaims this ad for Southgate, a “fashionable colony” of five Bing & Bing buildings on East 51st and East 52nd Street designed by Emery Roth.
“Set apart from the rest of the town” for “smart New Yorkers”…I’m sold!
Tags: 1930s NYC Apartment Ads, El Dorado Apartment Building NYC, El Dorado Central Park West, Luxury New York Apartments 1930s, New York in the 1930s, New Yorker July 1935, NYC Apartment Ads 1930s, Old New York City Apartment Ads, One Fifth Avenue Building, Parc Vendome 57th Street, Southgate Beekman Hill NYC
Ephemeral New York 
February 24, 2020 at 5:58 am |
$1300 per YEAR? On Park Avenue or Fifth Avenue? Are you sure? Even then that seems low for that class of clientele!
February 24, 2020 at 3:42 pm |
Luckily Douglas Elliman is still in the real estate business…give them a call and check!
February 24, 2020 at 7:58 pm |
$1300 in 1935 would be $24,949 in today’s dollars. For a month, that would be insanely expensive for a one bedroom for any class of clientele.
February 24, 2020 at 9:50 pm
My father always said I didn’t know the value of a dollar! Obviously, it was a lot more than I remember it being!
February 24, 2020 at 6:56 am |
Buddy, can you spare 15cents so I can get this week’s N.Y.er?
February 24, 2020 at 11:35 am |
I really shouldn’t look at old ads for luxury apartments right after I get my rent bill.
February 24, 2020 at 4:17 pm |
Love this era of advertising
February 25, 2020 at 2:52 am |
just Googled these for pictures of apartments in the buildings as they are now. They’re still lovely, but the rooms are so modernized! Not a sign of decorative moulding anywhere…
February 25, 2020 at 4:41 pm |
I believe it, stripped of their interior glory. At least the facades are still the same.