Starrett–Lehigh Building

About

The Starrett–Lehigh Building is a 19-story building at 601 West 26th Street, occupying the full block between Eleventh Avenue, 26th Street, Twelfth Avenue, and 27th Street, in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It was built between 1930 and 1931 by the Starrett Corporation and the Lehigh Valley Railroad (LV), who formed a joint venture to develop a freight terminal and warehouse to replace the railroad's previous freight terminal. The structure was designed by the firm of Cory & Cory, with Yasuo Matsui as the associate architect and the firm of Purdy & Henderson as the consulting structural engineers. The Starrett–Lehigh Building has largely been used as an office building since the late 1990s.

Much of the Starrett–Lehigh Building is 18 stories tall; the central portion is 19 stories tall, while the westernmost portion is nine stories tall due to the site's geology. The building's facade has alternating bands of steel strip windows, brickwork, polygonal corners, and large setbacks. The interior has large concrete floor plates, with a total volume of 26 million cubic feet (740,000 m3) and a rentable floor area of 1.8 million square feet (170,000 m2). There was a rail yard and driveways at ground level, as well as three freight elevators that carried trucks to delivery bays on the upper levels. Widely acclaimed on its completion, the Starrett–Lehigh Building was displayed at the Museum of Modern Art's 1932 "Modern Architecture: International Exhibition", and its design was imitated by other structures. Although the exterior remains intact, the railroad tracks have been removed, and many of the old freight-delivery areas have been converted into amenity areas such as a billiard room, indoor golf machines, and a shuffleboard court.