S. J. Kessler and Sons | Bronze Plaque for Apartments | Extant | Rockaway Beach | Apartment Building | 1964 | Located just across the street from the Rockaway Beach boardwalk, originally these buildings were clad in white brick and probably looked more similar to the Kesslers’ most prominent design, Washington Square Village. Today the buildings have been resurfaced in tan stucco with some dark red horizontal areas and dark red slab balconies which give the buildings a more drab, utilitarian appearance. The five buildings only occupy 11% of the total land but the site is minimally landscaped. The awards program description also states that houses of worship were included in the design, which could possibly refer to the pre-existing St. Rose of Lima Church and Temple of Israel on Beach 84th Street.
Birnbaum, Philip | Bronze Plaque for Apartments | Extant | Bayside | Apartment Building | 1962 | Designed by prolific apartment designer Philip Birnbaum and built by noted Queens developer Morton Pickman, this 14-story apartment complex still towers over the Bayside neighborhood around it. The design is fairly standard for Birnbaum, efficient yet state of the art, providing amenities such as an Olympic swimming pool, rooftop garden, and private terraces. Some “of-the-moment” features are noted in the awards writeup, such as music played throughout the public spaces and an oriental style lobby. These elements have not survived to the present day, although the severe marble lobby has glints of its past.
York and Sawyer | Bronze Plaque for Public Buildings | Extant | Elmhurst | Healthcare or Nursing Facility | 1956 | A large, sprawling mid-century hospital complex, Elmhurst General Hospital is still surprisingly intact on the exterior. Still visible in large part on the secondary facades is the original salmon colored brick and some of the exterior terraces, used in the 1950s and 60s but abandoned for interior state of the art interior facilities today. York and Sawyer, the classicists of banks and hospitals in Manhattan designed this hospital, most likely as a last gasp of the firm and no doubt with some consulting help.
Kavy-Kavovitt | Bronze Plaque for Apartments | Extant | Jackson Heights | Apartment Building | 1955 | One of the later Jackson Heights developments, this building is a standard brick mid-century development, using a central recessed entrance with large courtyard planting area and end balconies for the high end apartments.
Liebman-Liebman and Associates | Bronze Plaque for Office Buildings | Extant | Forest Hills | Office Building | 1969 | The Cord Meyer Office Building is a late gasp of corporate modernism in Queens. Cord Meyer was responsible for much of the development of Forest Hills, developing housing from the turn of the century through the 1980s and later switching efforts to coop conversions and real estate management. Their nine-story office building occupies a prominent intersection in Forest Hills along Queens Boulevard, standing conspiciously among significantly lower-rise residential neighbors. The building is clad in a bronze-colored aluminum and glass exterior curtain wall capped by a masonry tower at one end. The whole building floats above a commercial base which has been altered. The Building Award still hangs inside the lobby entrance.
