The Palace of 5 Beekman Street: The Past, Present, and Future
Of a Newly Discovered Forgotten Landmark
People often think that everything noteworthy in New York City has been discovered and widely publicized. The cities vast and intricate infrastructure is something to be marveled at and exposed to world. The city’s infamous skyscrapers, parks, unique media, and one of a kind cultures, have all been widely attributed to the city’s grandeur and illustriousness. However, the world has seemed to forget about one large piece of the city’s prestigious façade. The palace located at 5 Beekman Street has been abandoned for over 70 years. This building is not just one of NYC’s abandoned, rundown, factories or decrepit structures, but is a 9 story, beautifully crafted edifice that happens to be one of the first skyscrapers built in the city. The location is in limbo with its future purpose being debated, and this very teetering of the buildings potential use is what makes it such an interesting site. It is by all means an art world not only for its stunning architectural construction, but for always evolving use of the space. From the building’s first tenants of offices and residences, to more recently movie sets and catwalks, this building has been used for many things and it is widely agreed that it is its abandoned stark interior that lends itself to artistic manipulation. The marvelous building was erected between the years of 1881 through 1883 by the means of extremely wealthy Irish banker Eugene Kelly. He was a self-made millionaire by his success in banking after following the gold rush to San Francisco (Wilson). Kelly accumulated a net worth of about twenty-five million dollars, which is the equivalent of about 630 million dollars by today’s standards. Builders of the time were looking higher than the common four-story structures throughout the city, and from 1870 to 1890, nine and ten story buildings grew between Bowling Green and City Hall. The Kelly Building acquired 9 stories, with two corner towers stretching one story higher.
The Real Estate Record and Builders’ Guide commended the timing of Kelly’s ambitious construction project by stating, The demand for offices is no longer confined to the neighborhood of the Stock, Mining, Cotton and Produce Exchanges. All the great industries, which are represented in New York, are using offices instead of stores, and these last are very profitable. (Dunlap)
By March 1882, the building had been christened Temple Court, due to the anticipation of its many law offices. It was completed a year later.
The merchant Irish-American multimillionaire commissioned the palace to be designed by prominent architects of the time, Silliman and Farnsworth. The Neo-Greco, Queen Anne, and Renaissance revival style building was fabricated from an assortment of materials which included red Philadelphia brick, tan Dorchester stone, and terracotta, all above a two-story granite base (Wilson).
When Eugene Kelly died, he asked for all of his properties to be sold except for Temple Court. The building would remain in Kelly’s trust until “it would be clearly detrimental to the estate to hold it longer” (Kelly). The very sentimental value Temple Court obviously possessed only adds the somewhat mysterious contemplation as to why such a significant location would be left untouched and unmaintained for so long.
Carr, Nick. Temple Court's Facade. 2010. Photograph. 5 Beekman Street, New York.

Carr, Nick. Temple Court's Facade. 2010. Photograph. 5 Beekman Street, New York.

Modernly referred to as 5 Beekman Street, the palace was ahead of its time in many ways. The building was the third New York City structure to be fitted with elevators and the completely stone infrastructure was considered an ingenious way of insuring that the palace was indeed fireproof. But perhaps one of the most remarkable characteristics of this late 1800’s gem is its full-height interior atrium. The luminous atrium, constructed of clad iron and glass spans the width and length of the massive staircase rotunda (Wilson). The atrium was rediscovered when a recent and rare opportunity to investigate the building’s interior came to film location scout Nick Carr. Stumbled upon, the atrium gave the newly investigated building an amazing architectural aesthetic like a diamond in the ruff. The pictures captured during the uncovering gave curious outsiders a sneak peek, and created an Internet phenomenon.

Carr, Nick. Temple Court Atrium. 2010. Photograph. 5 Beekman Street, New York.

Carr, Nick. Temple Court Atrium. 2010. Photograph. 5 Beekman Street, New York.

The views of the building’s almost completely untouched, abandoned insides captivated the questioning public and with the exposure palace’s immensely astounding atrium publicized, the atrium has been dubbed the city’s “most beautiful” according to bloggers of the city’s architectural uniqueness (Lanter). In 1940, the atrium was boarded up due to fire code violations according to the New York Times. The entrance to the atrium and the top floor of the marvelous rotunda was walled up and disguised so later tenants of the building were blind to what lay beyond. “Though a secret door offered an amazing discovery to those who stumbled upon it” (Carr). Today, the atrium is completely up to code and ready for restoration by any potential development project. 31 years after the completion of the Kelly Building, in 1913 the famous Woolworth Building was completed offering a breathtaking view to viewers gazing through the glass atrium only adding to vast, almost completely vertically panoramic vista the atriu. offered. Today the building is mostly being used as the backdrop for supermodel photo shoots. Model and offspring to Rolling Stones member Keith Richards, Alexandra Richards shot a fashion shoot in the 5 Beekman Building for StyleCaster Media Group in October 2010. Ironically, however, the behind-the-scenes video footage of the shoot focused more on the building than the Richards or the extravagant couture she sported, which included large and ostentatious ostrich feathers. According to Curbed NY’s depiction of the fashion shoot, videographer Blake Martin explained his purposeful focus by stating, "I fell in love with the gorgeous and decaying space and it quickly became a character in this video piece. The final product is a celebration of the building in its current state and the temporary presence of our crew, which worked tirelessly in the August heat to create beautiful images” (Martin, Lanter). The success of the shoot and the attention the media brought to the once unknown location, are causing dismay amongst media groups due to the potential transformation of the building into private property. The use of the space as trendy, eclectic, and urban backdrop, is becoming increasingly difficult.
Rockstar offspring turned supermodel, Alexandra Richards isn’t the only hyped visitor of the newly utilized location. 5 Beekman is also being used as the setting of films and TV shows such as the AMC show “Rubicon”,Law & Order, White Collar, and Person of Interest. The building humbled even Kanye West when he showed up at 3 a.m. on a freezing February morning for a music video shoot. All of these events and shoots eventually brought in $1 million. Luckily, Temple Court survived long enough to be declared a landmark and, despite its recent decrepitude, it has a bright future ahead.
GB Lodging, which took over the building in March of 2012, is restoring and converting it into a hotel with Landmarks' blessings, plus adding a new 40-story tower to be constructed down Nassau Street. GB announced the latest plan is for 287 hotel rooms along with 68 residences to be the outcome of the building’s conversion. The hotel is scheduled to open next year, and although the beautiful building is closed to the public, it has many very excited to see the outcome of its massive conversion.

Works Cited
Lanter, Christopher. Curbed NY. 12 Nov. 2010. 22 Nov. 2010 <http://ny.curbed.com/ tags/ 5-beekman-street>.

The Curbed NY website offers a lot of information on the Beekman Tower’s present and future endeavors. It gives insight into investors and the buildings uses of today and tomorrow. The author/blogger is an accredited film scout.

Wilson , Michael . "Open Court." The New York TImes 19 Nov. 2010: MB1.

This recent New York Times article delves into the architectural mastery recently found within the Temple Court Building aka the Beekman Building. It describes the rarity of such a beautiful building with its gigantic glass atrium being abandoned and almost forgotten about for a long period of time. The New York Times is the newspaper of record for the city.

Carr , Nick. "The Abandoned Palace at 5 Beekman Street." The Huffington Post 19 Nov. 2010: 4

This article depicts the recent opportunity of a film location scout that was given a rare and special opportunity to go inside and investigate the mysterious building. I could use the pictures within the article to get a sense of the architecture and the film scouts commentary is useful to provide what it was like to enter the building.

Dunlap, David W. "Around City Hall, The Past Is New." The New York Times 19 Apr. 1998: MB2.

This New York Times article discussed the locale around NYC’s city hall and references the Beekman Building a lot. It describes its architecture and purpose at the time.