If you know Carrère and Hastings, you know they designed the New York Public Library. They also designed this five-story limestone townhouse at 9 East 91st Street. While the library is a public face of their work, this building is regarded as one of their finest residences. It was built in 1903 for a New York City banker named John Henry Hammond.
The building features pronounced banded rustication on the ground floor. On the upper floors, the windows are progressively smaller. Since 1994, the Russian Federation has used the house as a consulate, following a long line of Russian diplomatic activity in New York that started way before this specific house existed.
Before this limestone block was on the scene, the Russian Empire handled its emigrant business from the Flatiron Building. Later, the Soviet Union opened a consulate on East 61st Street in 1934. That location eventually became the site of a very messy 1948 drama involving a teacher named Oksana Kasenkina and a jump from a third-story window.
You can still see the craftsmanship of 1903 in every block of stone. The house serves as the diplomatic mission of the Russian Federation in New York City today.
Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons
Written by Kyle McLonely
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