The Henry T. Sloane House is a mansion at 9 East 72nd Street on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. It is along 72nd Street's northern sidewalk between Fifth Avenue and Madison Avenue. The five-story building was designed by Carrère and Hastings in the French Beaux-Arts style, and was built from 1894 to 1896. The house, along with the neighboring structure at 7 East 72nd Street, has been owned since 2002 by the government of Qatar, which has combined the two buildings into a single residence.
The limestone facade is divided vertically into four bays and rises four stories from the street. The facade includes rusticated limestone blocks on the first story, a colonnade of Ionic columns on the second and third stories, and a mansard roof on the fourth story. The house originally spanned , with various living spaces on the second floor and bedrooms on the upper stories. After 7 and 9 East 72nd Street were combined, the residence included a swimming pool and a roof terrace.
The building was originally constructed for the family of Henry T. Sloane, son of the founder of the carpet firm W. & J. Sloane. Following an acrimonious divorce, Sloane abandoned the house in 1899, and the family of Joseph Pulitzer rented it the next year. In 1901, it was purchased by the banker James Stillman, who lived there until his death in 1918. The house was then occupied by the carpet manufacturer John Sanford and then by the Riker family. The Lycée Français de New York, which already occupied the neighboring mansion at 7 East 72nd Street, moved into the house in 1964. The house became a New York City designated landmark in 1977. The school vacated 7 and 9 East 72nd Street in 2002, when they were sold to Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, the Emir of Qatar. After the Qatari government finished renovating and combining the buildings in 2010, the two structures comprised New York City's largest single-family residence.
Site The Henry T. Sloane House is at 9 East 72nd Street, along the northern side of 72nd Street between Fifth Avenue and Madison Avenue, on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. The house originally had a frontage of on 72nd Street and a north–south depth of . Since 2010, the house has been connected with the former Oliver Gould Jennings House at 7 East 72nd Street, immediately to the west, forming a single residence. The two houses collectively occupy a single rectangular land lot of , with a frontage of and a north–south depth of . Notable buildings nearby include the Pulitzer Mansion on the block to the north; 907 Fifth Avenue and 9 East 71st Street on the block to the south; and the Gertrude Rhinelander Waldo House and St. James' Episcopal Church on Madison Avenue to the east. In addition, Central Park is one half block to the west.
Architecture
The building was designed by Carrère and Hastings and is variously described as being in the French Beaux-Arts style or a "modern French" style. It was the third major building they designed in New York City (after the Edison Building and New York Evening Mail building). It is five stories high, although only four stories are visible from the street. The only visible elevation of the facade is on 72nd Street and is divided vertically into four bays. The facade is further divided horizontally into three sections, reminiscent of the base, shaft, and capital of a column.
Facade The first story constitutes the base of the facade and is composed of rusticated limestone blocks, which are plain in design. The westernmost bay includes a round-arched entryway, which in turn is topped by a cartouche flanked by scrolled brackets. The doorway was originally shielded by a marquee. The rest of the first-story facade has segmentally-arched windows.
The facade of the second and third floors is interspersed with double-height engaged columns in the Ionic order. The facade is recessed behind the Ionic columns, giving the facade an appearance of increased depth. The second floor is designed like a piano nobile, the main floor of a palazzo. There is a balustrade with recessed, arched French windows behind it. The French windows are topped by circular oeil-de-boeuf transom windows, as well as grids of mullions that separate the windows into multiple glass panels. At the top of each French window is an elaborate keystone at the center of each bay, as well as scrolled brackets on either side. The third story is smaller and contains segmentally-arched windows. There are also cartouches above the third-floor windows, which are decorated with garlands and scrolls. The Ionic columns support a heavy cornice with dentils or modillions, which runs horizontally across the facade above the third floor.
The fourth floor is within a mansard roof and is recessed behind a balustrade. On this story, there are four mansard windows, each corresponding to a bay on the first through third floors. The dormers protrude from the roof and are topped by flat-arched pediments. The use of flat-arched pediments on the fourth floor was intended to link it with the arched windows on the lower stories.
Features The house originally spanned and is decorated with details such as fireplaces and molded decorations. It was originally designed in the Louis XIV style, with rooms arranged around a "court of honor". The first floor has an entrance hall that is accessed via the court of honor. This hall measures and contains leaded glass windows, oak-and-iron doors from the entrance, a large fireplace, and a plaster ceiling with classical design details. A large curving staircase leads up to the second floor, with a metal balustrade, wall sconces, and various green-and-gold decorations. There is a reception room and study at the front of the first floor, as well as various staff rooms beside and at the rear of the courtyard.
At the front of the second floor is a drawing room measuring and a salon measuring . The rear of the second floor originally had a conservatory room and a dining room. These were connected to the drawing room, salon, and main stairway via a loggia. A butler's room abutted the loggia to the east, and a stairway just south of the courtyard continued up to the top stories. The upper stories were designed in a French style and contained the family bedrooms and servants' quarters. Many of the rooms retained their original decorations in the 2000s, including doorknobs, chandeliers, and lamps.
A New York Times article from 1941 described the house as having 28 rooms, including eight bathrooms. A conservatory room was later installed behind the main second-floor rooms. In the late 20th century, the interior of the house retained most of its original design details. For example, when a sprinkler line was installed, it passed over one of the house's original drapery rods. When 9 East 72nd Street was combined with the neighboring 7 East 72nd Street in 2010, the combined houses included two levels of bedrooms, a swimming pool, and two top floors for the staff. There was also a terrace above the two houses. Observer cites the two houses as occupying a combined , though the New York City Department of City Planning cites the gross floor area as .
History 9 East 72nd Street was originally constructed for Henry T. Sloane, whose father had founded the carpet firm W. & J. Sloane. Various members of the family married into other affluent New York City families in the late 19th century. These included Henry Sloane, who had, in 1880, married Jessie Ann Robbins, whose father was a partner in the wholesale drug firm of McKesson & Robbins. The Sloanes lived on 54th Street until the 1890s at a time when that part of Midtown Manhattan was filled with houses for the upper class.
Original residence Sloane ownership
By the mid-1890s, numerous wealthy families had settled on 72nd Street. Henry Sloane initially may wanted to buy a lot at the corner of 72nd Street and Fifth Avenue, but that corner was already occupied. Instead, he bought a 54-foot-wide site at 9 East 72nd Street. Initially, Sloane wanted to hire both McKim, Mead & White and Richard Morris Hunt to design competing plans for the house. Hunt's wife said that Sloane had intended to combine elements of both architecture firms' plans, not knowing that doing so would be an ethical taboo for both firms. Sloane ultimately hired John M. Carrère and Thomas Hastings of the firm. Drawings of the house's interiors were publicized in The American Architect and Building News as early as December 1893. Plans for the house were not formally filed with the New York City Department of Buildings until August 1894,; at which point the house was planned to cost $100,000. The house took two years to construct, and plans for the interior were modified during the construction process.
The house was recorded as being vacant in mid-1896, when a burglary prompted a police watchman to be posted outside the Sloanes' house, though $300,000 worth of furniture had been moved into the house by September 1896. During their first year at the house, the Sloanes hosted various housewarming events. One of the first events that the Sloanes hosted at the house was a dance party for more than 200 guests in January 1897, an event they also hosted the following year.; The Sloanes lived in the house for only about three years, after Jessie began having an affair with Perry Belmont of the wealthy Belmont family. Henry deeded the house to Jessie in October 1898, and he attempted to win his wife back by giving her all matter of gifts. Following a protracted disagreement, Henry separated from his wife in December 1898 and moved to his sister's house on 57th Street. Jessie, who frequently communicated with friends via a messenger call box in the house, found that some of her messages were intercepted after the couple had separated.
The Sloanes formally received a divorce in April 1899, when Jessie married Perry Belmont and promptly moved to Washington, D.C. Under the terms of the divorce, Jessie gave up the 72nd Street residence and agreed not to visit her two daughters until they turned 21 years old. If Henry did not agree to buy back the house, it was to be sold, with their two daughters sharing the profits. Henry agreed to buy the house that May, with the condition that he was to pay off about $64,000 worth of Jessie's personal debts. At the time, the house was valued at $450,000. After Henry bought back the house, he did not live there. Instead, in February 1900, Sloane leased the house to the publisher Joseph Pulitzer, who was living in the Hotel Netherland because his house at 55th Street had burned down. Pulitzer agreed to pay $17,500 a year in rent.; for a lease that expired in May 1901. Shortly after his family moved to 9 East 72nd Street, Pulitzer bought several lots one block north on 73rd Street for his permanent residence—the Joseph Pulitzer House.; The 1900 United States census shows that Pulitzer's household consisted of six people and that he employed another 17 servants.
Subsequent ownership