Sylvan Bien's 1938 4 East 70th Street

 

image via cityrealty.com

Following her high-profile divorce from millionaire Marshall Field, in 1937 Evelyn Field sold their massive mansion at 4-8 East 70th Street, running through the block to east 69th Street.  The original plans to convert it to a club never materialized, and Watford Estates, Inc. demolished the magnificent home as the site of two apartment buildings--at 4 East 70th and 3 East 69th Street.

Both buildings were designed by Sylvan Bien.  The New York Sun explained they were "similar in construction and are separated at the back by a garden...Each building is topped with a penthouse apartment occupying the entire roof space.  There are also terrace duplex apartments and a number of two-room, three-room and six-room duplexes, as well as three-room simplexes."

Bien's design for 4 East 70th Street was an Art Deco take on neo-Classical architecture. The entrance was flanked by black composite tiles under a jazzy gold-tone Art Deco cornice.  The central portion of the eight-story midsection featured full-height, fluted pilasters.

image via cityrealty.com

On July 16, 1938, The New York Sun reported that the two buildings "are practically completed, almost fully rented, and will be ready for occupancy in exactly a month."  Sylvan Bien told the journalist, "Every apartment will be an ideal little house.  What the decorators often strive to do afterwards we've done before."  The article said,

And he mentioned winding stairways, round foyers, rotundas with niches, fireplaces, oversized dressing rooms off baths, powder rooms, high clothes poles in fitted closets from which to hang evening gowns without dragging, highly styled kitchens designed for more or less servantless housekeeping.

At the time of the article, the low relief lobby murals by Pierre Bourdell were on exhibition at the Jacques Seligmann galleries.  The five murals paid homage to Manhattan life:  Fulton Fish Market, Circus on Broadway, Central Park Zoo, Library Steps, and Chinatown Festival.

The kitchens and kitchenettes included "enormous iceboxes."  The article noted, "Most of the gas ranges have two ovens, two broilers, six burners with a covering plate for every two."

Rent for the six-room duplexes ranged from $2,900 to $3,800 a year, "depending on the height of the floor"--about $6,850 per month for the most expensive in 2024 terms.  The penthouses, of course, were pricier, renting for as much as $6,000 a year ($10,800 per month today).  The Sun noted that they came with "wood-burning fireplaces and surrounding terraces with splendid view."

Among those who had signed leases at the time of the article was Russell Herts, whose six-room duplex on the fourth and fifth floors had already been decorated.  The Sun described it, saying:

Done in shades of green, turquoise, burgundy, yellow, with touches of silver, it accents the combination of painted walls and papered walls.  Living room and dining room are large and feature eighteenth century English furnishings.  The bedrooms above, are eighteenth century French.

Other tenants who had signed leases during construction were George R. Kantzler, Charles C. Wright and his wife Elizabeth, and Margaret Olcott.  Kantzler was a partner in the banking and brokerage firm J. E. Swan & Co.  

Margaret O'Donovan Olcott was the widow of actor, singer and songwriter Chauncey Olcott (the composer of, among other popular songs, When Irish Eyes Are Smiling and My Wild Irish Rose).  Described by the Troy Record as "wealthy in her own right," she would be moving here from 17 Sutton Place.  Her summer estate was Inniscarra in Saratoga Springs, New York.  On September 7, 1938, a society journalist with The Saratogian reported, "Mrs. Chauncey Olcott has returned from a visit in New York city, where, I understand, she inspected the penthouse she has leased at 4 East 70th St...Mrs. Olcott, I hear, is much pleased with her new apartment which is in a beautiful location.  She plans to pass September in Inniscarra."

Two postcards from the 1920s illustrated the Olcott summer home.

Margaret Olcott (known as Rita to her friends) was an author and playwright.  Among her plays were Lussmore and Ragged Robin.  In 1939, a few months after moving into 4 East 70th Street, she published a biography of her late husband, A Song in His Heart.  

Before then, however, she married Ralph Stuyvesant-Brown, "a descendant of Peter Stuyvesant," according to The New York Times, on December 23, 1938 in St. Vincent Ferrer's Church on Lexington Avenue.   The newspaper said that after the ceremony, "the couple will visit Ireland, England and France.  They plan to return to Inniscarra, Mrs. Olcott's Saratoga home, in time for the racing season there."

David M. Fruedenthal, his wife, Dorothy Fuld, and their daughter Rhoda were early residents.  Fruedenthal had joined Bloomingdale's in 1927 as controller, and was named vice-president in 1939.  Rhoda's engagement to Albert Carroll was announced on April 2, 1942.

In 1948, Fruedenthal resigned from Bloomingdales.  He and Dorothy moved to Rome where he served as deputy administrator of the Economic Cooperation Administration, the U.S. Government agency set up to administer the Marshall Plan.

Other well-heeled residents at the time included Howard Franklin Beebe, the former president of the American Investment Bankers Association, and his wife, the former Clara Belle Mitchell; and Nathan E. Handler and his wife, the former Gertrude Wolf.  Handler was a graduate of Columbia University and the founder of the Shepherd Knit-Wear Company.  The Handlers were lovers of music.  Their summer home in Lenox, Massachusetts was near Tanglewood and they counted among their friends, according to The New York Times, many musicians.

Chase H. and Charlotte R. Davis were married in Paris in 1921.  Charlotte had two children from her former marriage to the late Edward Mailer Radway--John Symonds and Frances Radway.  The family had two other residences, one in Cincinnati and a summer home in East Hampton.  John enlisted in the United States Marine Corps in 1942, and served with the Fourth Division in the Pacific theater.  The family was still here in 1946 when John became engaged to Judith Ann Lawson of Cincinnati.

Another resident to fight in World War II was William D. Lamborn, the son of Ody H. and Louise Davant Lamborn.  After attending Phillips Academy and Yale University, he fought with the Naval Air Arm.  He was discharged in 1946 with the rank of ensign, having been awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Air Medal with five clusters.

Ody H. Lamborn was the president of Lamborn & Co., sugar brokers.  He was described by The New York Times as "a longtime leader in the sugar industry."  Indeed, he had joined the family concern at the age of 15.  In 1943 he was a founder and the first executive director of the sugar Research Foundation.  The following year, he became president of the New York Coffee and Sugar Exchange and was made the first president of the National Association of Commodity Exchanges and Allied Trades.

In 1950, Alfred A. Scheffer designed the Lamborn's summer home in Beach Hampton--a Cape Cod style cottage with shingled and 18th century inspired windows.  Ody and Louse Lamborn were still living here when Ody died at the age of 74 on September 27, 1971.

The Lamborn's charming summer home in Beach Hampton.  image from Robert Hefner's "Alfred A. Scheffer's Beach Hampton Houses, 1941 to 1965."

By the late 1950s, Jacques Kaplan and his wife Claude Puiforcat lived here.  Born in Paris in 1924, Kaplan came from a family of furriers.  When the Nazis invaded France, the family fled to Antibes where Jacques joined the resistance.  The family relocated to New York City in 1942 and Jacque's father established a fur business on Fifth Avenue.  (Jacques immediately returned to Europe, fighting with the Fifth Armed Division in North Africa and earning the Croix de Guerre.)

Back in New York after the war, Jacques joined his father's firm, but brought his love of modern art to his fur fashions.  The New York Times later said, "Art and fur marched hand in hand...he experimented with novelties like shirred mink, from which he made raincoats.  Inspired by geometric art, he created a square mink coat."  But by the 1960s, he swore off the use of endangered species, like leopard and cheetah, earning praise from the World Wildlife Fund.

Jacques Kaplan, The David Gahr Archives

Jacques and Claude divorced in 1956, after which Jacques made his apartment a social and artistic center.  Francois Baschet writes in his The Sound Sculptures of Bernard and Francois Baschet, "Kaplan lived in a ground floor apartment at 4 East Seventieth Street that was as well-known as the Museum of Modern Art.  It was the gathering place of the movers and shakers of art and fashion of the 1960s."

Jacques Kaplan sold his fur business in 1969, and in the 1980s he and his second wife, Violaine Bachelier purchased a home in Kent, Connecticut, where Kaplan opened an art gallery.

Other than replacement windows, there are no substantial exterior changes to Sylvan Bien's 1938 design.

many thanks to reader Lowell Cochrane for suggesting this post

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