The 1931 Green Sixth Building - 100 Sixth Avenue

 

photograph by Beyond My Ken

Despite the Great Depression, real estate operator Vivian Green organized the 100 Sixth Avenue Corporation in 1929.  The syndicate assembled the properties along the south side of Watts Street between Sixth Avenue and Thompson Street as the site for a loft building.  On April 11, 1930, The New York Times reported that the old buildings were "being cleared for a $2,500,000 sixteen-story building designed by Shampan & Shampan."  (The costs would translate to about $47 million in 2025.)

Construction progressed swiftly.  Four months later, on August 2, the New York Evening Post reported that "work is proceeding rapidly" of the "sixteen-story reinforced concrete industrial building to be known as [the] Green Sixth Avenue Building."  The structure was completed within the year.

Shampan & Shampan's Art Deco-style factory building used steel framing to provide vast expanses of glass that filled the interiors with natural light.  The spandrels between floors were decorated with geometric designs executed in brick.  The architects made the most of cost-saving cast concrete, lavishing the tops of the setbacks with ornate panels.  Especially eye-catching were the bas-reliefs of workers and craftsmen on the second floor pilasters around all three sides.  Those on the Sixth Avenue elevation were polychromed.

A chemist works with test tubes (top) and a carpenter uses a plane in two panels.  photographs by Beyond My Ken.

The Green Sixth Building filled with a variety of tenants, several of them in the printing and the radio industries.  Among the first were the Pyramid Engraving Company, the Illustration Engraving Company, and J. Hoeffler & Co., Inc., manufacturer of printing inks.  The Oil Products Appliance Co., Inc. designed and manufactured oil dispensing equipment, like pumps.

Another printing firm, Parker Guy & Co., was also an initial tenant.  A year after moving in, on September 17, 1932, Lillian Landis left the office to withdrawal the week's payroll of $461 at the Corn Exchange Bank.  (Employees were paid in cash at the end of each week.)  With the envelope in hand, she started back to the office.  On Canal Street near Varick, she was set upon by a man who "snatched the money and escaped before Miss Landis's cries for help brought a policeman," reported The New York Times.  The bandit escaped with the equivalent of $10,600 today.

A metal worker weighs what appears to be gold (top) and a turner works on a lathe.  photographs by Beyond My Ken.

The Freed Radio Sales Company and the Fulton Radio Corporation leased space in April 1932.  They were the first of several radio-related tenants to come.  By 1938, the Wholesale Radio Service was here.  In the November 1938 issue of Popular Mechanics, it advertised do-it-yourself radio kits.  "Thrill to performance that outstrips many a 'store bought' set," said the ad.

Among the first publishers in the building was Harry L. Lindquist.  In November 1933, he released Harry M. Konwiser's Texas Republic Postal System, described by The New York Times as "the story of the post office system of the Republic of Texas."  

The Traffic Publishing Company, here as early as 1940, offered just one item: The Official Directory of Commercial Traffic Executives.  The annual register came with an appendix of transportation commissions and organizations.

Another industry-specific publisher, here by 1946, was the American Health Publishers, Inc.  In 1948 the Fiction Book Club took space, and in 1949 the Book of the Month Club moved into two floors.

In the meantime, printing firms, along with publishers, continued to be a significant presence in the building.  The Eagle Printing Ink division of the Sun Chemical Corporation was here in 1946.  Greystone Press was here in 1950 when it released decorating books like How to Use Color and Decorating Designs in the Home, The Standard Book of American Antique Furniture, and The Complete Book of Interior Decorating and Every Woman's Guide to Traditional and Modern Furniture.  Major publisher Simon & Schuster was in the building as early as 1952.

Recording firms first appeared here just after mid-century.  Music Treasures of the World operated here in 1955, operating a mail-order record-of-the month club.  Similar record clubs here at the time were the American Recording Society and the Capitol Record Club, Inc.

The publishers of Playbill occupied space in the 1970s, as did the Encyclopedia of Photography.  In 1992, the AHF Marketing Research, Inc. signed the lease for a 22,000 square-foot floor.

An interesting exhibition was staged in the ground floor in December 2021.  Thirty-four high-definition, quarter-sized prints of Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel were installed.  Melissa Smith of The New York Times remarked on December 23, "While not quite bringing Vatican City to New York, the reproductions lining the space at 'Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel' enable viewers to see details that would be difficult to make out in the originals without a set of binoculars."

photograph by Tdorante10

Routinely misattributed to architect Ely Jacques Kahn, the building's facade was aggressively cleaned recently--removing the colorful paint of the Sixth Avenue bas reliefs.  

many thanks to reader Elizabeth Janovsky for suggesting this post