The A. I. Namm & Son Department Store is a commercial structure at 450–458 Fulton Street, at the southeast corner with Hoyt Street, in the Downtown Brooklyn neighborhood of New York City, United States. It is the last remaining structure of a complex of buildings constructed for the A. I. Namm & Son Department Store chain. The current structure, built in 1924–1925 and expanded in 1928–1929, is eight stories tall and was designed by Robert D. Kohn and Charles Butler in the Art Deco style. It is a New York City designated landmark.
The A. I. Namm & Son store was founded in 1876 by the Polish immigrant Adolph I. Namm in Manhattan's Ladies Mile district. Namm moved to Brooklyn in 1885, and the store moved to the intersection of Fulton and Hoyt streets in 1890. The store expanded several times over the next three decades, covering nearly the entire city block. By the 1920s, it was one of the United States' largest cash-only department stores. The current structure replaced Namm's original building on the site when it was completed in February 1925, and it was expanded in November 1929. The buildings underwent several renovations between the 1930s and the 1950s. After Namm's merged with Frederick Loeser & Co. in the 1950s, the Namm-Loeser chain closed its former Brooklyn store. Most of the site was razed in 1957, while the remainder of the building operated as an Abraham & Straus store until 1980. Since then, the structure has been resold several times.
When the current buildings were completed, few contemporary architectural publications wrote about the structures. The facade of the current building is divided horizontally into four sections and includes decorative features such as pilasters, balconies, and pediments. As built, the first two stories were clad in bronze and stone, while the upper stories were clad in limestone. There is a curved corner at the intersection of Fulton and Hoyt streets, and the building originally had a large entrance on Fulton Street. Inside, the basement and several above-ground stories were used as sales floors, while the upper stories had inventory rooms and offices. The previous buildings on the site contained additional selling space for the A. I. Namm store.
Site The A. I. Namm & Son Department Store building is located at 1 Hoyt Street, at the southeastern corner of Hoyt Street and Fulton Street, in the Downtown Brooklyn neighborhood of New York City. It occupies a mostly rectangular land lot on the city block bounded by Fulton Street to the north, Hoyt Street to the west, Livingston Street to the south, and Elm Place to the east. The lot has an area of , with a frontage of on Hoyt Street and on Fulton Street, Nearby buildings include 388 Bridge Street to the northwest, the Offerman Building to the north, and 11 Hoyt to the south. In addition, the entrances to the New York City Subway's Hoyt Street station are next to the building.
History The A. I. Namm store's namesake and founder was Polish immigrant Adolph I. Namm, who opened a trimmings store within the Ladies' Mile in Manhattan, at Sixth Avenue and 18th Street, in 1876. Namm relocated to 286 Fulton Street in Brooklyn during 1885, and he then moved to 335–337 Fulton Street two years later. At the time, many of Brooklyn's largest stores were located on "lower Fulton Street", near Fulton Ferry, while Namm's was located on what the public commonly considered as "upper Fulton Street". 335–337 Fulton Street, a four-story brick edifice, was severely damaged in a fire in December 1890. Namm was already considering relocating to another structure; the fire prompted him to move "uptown" to Hoyt Street.
Earlier buildings
Namm leased the site at the corner of Fulton Street and Hoyt Street from theatrical managers Hyde and Behman in November 1890, paying $10,000 per year. Namm announced his intention to spend $60,000 erecting a store on the site, with entrances on both streets. After relocating to Fulton and Hoyt Street, Namm gradually acquired buildings and added new selling departments to his store. Namm bought a land lot on Hoyt Street, with a narrow wing leading to Fulton Street, from Hyde and Behman for $200,000 in 1893. The ground floor was originally operated by S. R. Jonap & Co. as a "dry-goods emporium". The building was damaged by flooding after a water tank on the roof burst in 1896. At the end of 1898, Namm bought the adjacent Zipp's Casino and began renovating the structure. The old Zipp's Casino extended east to Elm Place, giving the Namm store a third entrance from that street. The store's Elm Place annex had been completed by April 1900.
During the 1900s, Adolph Namm continued to buy additional nearby properties and expand his store. Namm's expanded to a three-story building on Hoyt Street in September 1902. New York City officials approved plans for a six-story wing on Hoyt Street, south of the existing structure, in 1906. Workers began rebuilding a structure at 454 Fulton Street and erecting the six-story Hoyt Street wing, which opened in November 1907. Namm's added various departments to the fourth and fifth floors in early 1908, including a home-furnishings department and a shade-and-screen department. The company also expanded other departments throughout the building and added an entrance with two arches along Fulton Street. The 1907–1908 expansions doubled Namm's floor area and gave the building entrances from all sides of the city block. The store had 75 departments by its 33rd anniversary in 1909. Even with the completion of the Hoyt Street annex, Namm's quickly outgrew its existing structures.
Namm's proposed erecting an eight-story wing on Hoyt and Livingston streets in May 1912, partly on the site of a theater known as the Grand Opera House. Construction of the Hoyt and Livingston annex began the same year, with contractors completing the iron frame in five weeks. The Hoyt and Livingston annex officially opened in January 1913, providing additional space for the store's selling departments and offices. The Interborough Rapid Transit Company agreed to allow Namm's to build a subway entrance from the store's basement to the Hoyt Street station in September 1914. The subway entrance opened two months later, along with a sewing machine department. Spurred by growing patronage, Namm's installed escalators between the first and second floors during late 1915. During World War I, the store's windows contained various exhibits and posters related to the war effort, and Namm's operated a recruiting office on the fourth floor. To reduce congestion caused by delivery trucks, Namm's relocated its delivery depot out of the building in 1918. The next year, a department for novelty furniture opened at the store.
1920s expansions
A. I. Namm & Sons had decided to expand its store by 1920. The company opened a "bargain basement" that April, and it hosted a groundbreaking ceremony for an annex at the corner of Elm Place and Livingston Street two months later. This annex occupied part of the site of the Grand Opera House, which in turn replaced the Elm Place Congregational Church; artifacts from the old church were incorporated into the annex's cornerstone. By then, the building occupied nearly the entire city block between Fulton, Hoyt, and Livingston streets and Elm Place, and it employed between 1,200 and 2,100 people at different times of the year. The first story of the Livingston annex opened in November 1920, and the entire annex opened in February 1921 at a total cost of $1.5 million. The new wing provided space for an art shop, apparel department, and furniture and bedding departments. Following the expansion, the store had , along with 17 elevators, five stairs, and a direct subway entrance. The company built an additional entrance on Livingston Street and added several display windows during 1922 and 1923.
Namm's acquired three buildings on Fulton Street in June 1923 and issued $3.5 million of bonds the same month to fund an expansion of the store. By then, Namm's was the third-largest cash-only department store in the U.S. Namm's formally announced in January 1924 that it would be erecting a nine-story annex along Fulton Street, more than doubling the store's Fulton Street frontage, to designs by Kohn & Butler. This required demolishing Namm's original store at 452 Fulton Street and the adjoining Huyler and Liggett stores. The plans involved building a nine-story building on Fulton Street, measuring wide, as well as a 15-story tower with setbacks behind it. Work on the nine-story section was to begin first, in May 1924, and last five months. A new clothing department opened at Namm's in September 1924, and the Fulton Street annex had topped out by the next month. Namm's annex formally opened on February 4, 1925. The company never built the 15-story tower on Livingston Street, citing the fact that the new annex was large enough for the store's operations. Namm's instead placed the tower's site for sale.
Namm's opened a radio department in September 1925, and the company began renovating two floors of the new Fulton Street annex for its buying department that November. The company leased space in the adjoining 468 Fulton Street, opening a "sample room" there in early 1926. After completing its first annex on Fulton Street, Namm's bought additional lots on Fulton and Hoyt streets. In June 1928, Namm's announced that they would construct yet another annex at Fulton and Hoyt streets, also designed by Kohn & Butler, as well as reconstruct an existing structure on Livingston and Hoyt streets. The Sorosis Shoe Company's building, which occupied the site, could not be demolished until its lease expired at the beginning of February 1929. The annex at Fulton and Hoyt streets, measuring on Fulton Street and on Hoyt Street, opened in September 1929, in time for Namm's 53rd anniversary. The annex was finished by that November, giving the store of floor area. The site of the expanded building spanned , nearly the entirety of the block.
1930s to 1950s
By 1930, the A. I. Namm & Son Department Store employed 2,000 people in 200 departments. That September, Namm's opened a third entrance to its store from Hoyt Street, as well as a gift shop and a glasses store on Livingston Street. Namm's opened a broadcasting studio for radio station WMCA at the building in November 1931, and it leased an adjacent store on Fulton Street the next year, opening a self-service department there. Four elevators were also added to the Hoyt Street portion of the building in 1933. Mayor Fiorello La Guardia dedicated five diesel generators in the building's basement in 1936; the generators powered an air-conditioning system in the basement, first floor, and second floor.
Namm's renovated its handbag department and added a "hat bar" on the building's ground floor in 1943. The company remodeled the store's Fulton Street entrance in 1945, replacing a show window with a direct entrance from the street. The store remained successful in the mid-1940s, with 125 selling departments spread across the basement and the first five stories. During this time, Namm's hired Morris Lapidus to renovate the store. After Lapidus remodeled the building's ground floor in 1946, Namm's added five additional selling departments to that floor.