Though now a Jerusalemite, I am a New Yorker by birth and you know what they say, you can take the girl out of the city but you can’t take the city out of the girl. So, while I love featuring local art, architecture and design, I may, every now and then, hark back to the alter heim.
The Campbell Apartment in the Grand Central Terminal in midtown Manhattan, though referred to as “the apartment” was never residential, rather leased as office space to tycoon John W. Campbell by the Vanderbilts.
Campbell hired the architect Augustus N. Allen to design a space reminiscent of a 13th century Florentine palace. A couple of the more unusual details were the $300,000 (around $3.5 million today) Persian rug covering the entire floor and the pipe organ he had installed to have famous musicians perform for guests for whom he’d throw recitals. After Campbell’s death in 1957, most of the furnishings, including the rug, disappeared from the apartment. Until its restoration in 1999 it has served such functions as a signalman’s office, station closet where transit police officers stored guns and other items and it was also used as a small prison, where the present-day bar is located, in front of the leaded glass windows. In 2006 it was redesigned by interior designer Nina Campbell, replacing some of the blues in the initial renovation to reds as expressed by the current palette.
The Campbell Apartment is located at 15 Vanderbilt Avenue between 42nd and 43rd Streets. It is open Monday-Saturday from 3pm to 1am, Sunday from 3pm to midnight, and is always available for private parties. Proper attire (no sneakers, no jeans, no baseball caps) is required.
Oh, and if any of you Gossip Girl fans are wondering why it looks so familiar, it was the filming location where Chuck Bass witnessed Nate and Serena’s “encounter” in the first season.
Photographs copyright 2007 Jessica D. Korman, all rights reserved
Wow – what a beautiful room and well written text! I really would like to go there one day and have a drink. I love the pictures too!