#seth greer

[fuckinuhhh]

Architectural Finds, 06/24/2023

My walk today was a brief 20 minutes, I was meeting up with a friend from upstate for some chai who had come down the night before to stay with some other friends. We met up at the Chai Spot on Mott St. (which I definitely now recommend) and we relaxed in their backroom lounge with our chai's for 45 min or so. She eventually had to leave to catch her bus back upstate & I walked her to the subway stairs hugged her and said goodbye. Feeling the warm weather on my skin and the caffeine in my veins I decided to walk up Broadway, here were some of the architectural highlights.

This cute turret room on the top of the building on the NE corner of Bleecker & Broadway. Doing the smallest ammount of googling I am finding out this was Peter Venkman's (Bill Murray) apartment in Ghostbusters 2???? ok.

It just looks like it would be such a whimsical little tower to hang your hair from, idk.

Building Facts: Built in 1891 as the Manhattan Savings Institution, also known as Bleecker Tower. Architect Stephen Decatur Hatch.

Built in the Romanesque Revival style with arches and ornaments, as well as the red sandstone and signature rough cut stone of this style on the base of the building (definitely why it caught my eye, I love Richardson Romanesque/romanesque revival).

The tower on top eludes my brief internet search, but if anyone has pictures of the inside please direct them to me.

Next up we have this lil copper cutie who looks like it just got a face lift judging by the shiny copper facade on top. It is currently a FootLocker so hopefully they're treating her nice.

Building Facts: (obv) Built in 1889 by Architect Alfred Zucker.

The menacing gargoyles are cute.

(maybe more of an opinion than a fact, but) there used to be a bookstore called Shakepeare's on the bottom floor and the top floors were 1-per-floor studio spaces for artists to live/work in, & I wish that was the case today, not footlocker and high rent.

MOVING ON, we've got this pair of cuties. Don't they look like the best of friends holding hands ready to face the world side by side? These guys are 734 (left) and 732 (right) Broadway.

734: Built in 1872 by Architects David & John Jardine in Cast-Iron Neo-Grec style. Until ~2015, the facade had become a rusted brown/black mess until they cleaned and repainted it.

732: Built in 1854 by unknown.

This little building has a complicated past but ill try and summarize the small dig I just did on it. Originally it was a 3.5 peaked-roof building as a set of 3 houses for wealthy sisters (daughters of John Mason) from 732-736 designed by an undocumented architect. It underwent large renovations twice in its life, and one small renovation adding the Treffurth's sign on the roof cornice. The first renovation happened in 1885 by Henry Janeway Hardenbergh (god write a romance novel already would you) and allowed the introduction of E. A. Mac's bookstore to take the place of the earlier saloon on the bottom floor. It was then renovated in 1900 by Bruno W. Berger to the Cast-Iron more or less Renaissance Revival facade we see today.

-

Im going to keep these next ones brief because I'm beginning to lose steam :)

1 Astor Place

Built in 1883 by Architects Starkweather & Gibbs (they also designed the Potter Building). Brick & Terracotta above Cast-Iron ground floor facade.

Originally it was used as a hotel and boarding house with ground floor stores. The harsh vertical motifs on the exterior caught my eye, and I was drawn in even more by the harmony of the design elements and color choices.

10 Astor Place aka 444 Lafayette St

Built in 1876 by Architect Griffith Thomas to the same owner as the above building, Orlando B. Potter, who seemed to have impeccable taste in architecture.

I love the ornate implementation of the painted white Cast-Iron in the arches and pillar ornaments on this one. As well as the eye-popping contrast of the white paint on dark red brick, kind of a juxtaposed take on themes seen in the building above with the way the red and black elements seem to blend in together in harmony.

21 Astor Place aka Clinton Hall

Built in 1891 by George E. Harney.

Originally a Library for the New York Mercantile Library. I love the classic industrial look its such a strong look while they still tried to give elements of the facade some artistic nuance like in the arched windows and dark banding.

Only Caught the side of this Collonade building but doing more research on it, it's owned by the Blue Man Group????

Built 1831 by Seth Greer and historically home to family member's of the Astor & Vanderbilt families, it is the oldest building I took note of today.

And of course, how could I not be drawn into the Cooper Union Foundation building's charm. It stands seemingly so alone in the heart of Manhattan, close to a modern miracle.

Built in 1859 by Frederick A. Peterson in the (what I'm finding now to be called) Rundbogenstil German neo-Romanesque style.

I didn't realize it at the time but this picture also seems to be the back of the building. Still just such ornate and well-balanced design!

HONORABLE MENTIONS: This house on top of this building and the cute lil mansard moment next to it, which I searched and searched for but I cant seem to remember where it is.

Edit: I found it, there were street signs in the picture whoops. The one with the cottage is 203 E 13th Street also known as Pear Tree Place. And the little guy with the mansard roof is 109 3rd ave, both of them resting above Kiehls 3rd ave.

DISHONORABLE MENTIONS: This NYU Alumni building. Who designed you, they should be ashamed. What is going on with your offset, unbalanced terraces in the back? Awful. What was the point of all of these different colored brick patches?? Uncomfortable, awful. It looks like a neutral-toned Duplo set.

Built in 1986 and I cant even find the architect so you know they weren't very proud of it.

[yes-i-have-thoughts]

Eye for an Eye and the World Goes Blind

Something inspired for the alt AU by @shmorp-mcdurgen that I didn’t have to piggyback off an anon for this time, wahoo!

Also first time writing for both Gabriel and Seth weeee

SUMMARY: Gabriel’s the first person to find out what really happened to the old lieutenant and live to tell the tale. They had help, of course...But from the last person they expected to help them.

TW: PANIC ATTACK, BLOOD, LOSS OF A LIMB, MENTIONS OF STARVING, BRIEF USE OF GUN, IMPLIED (BRIEF) DEATH

If this is what a panic attack felt like, they vowed to never again berate any officer having one in front of them.

Gabriel’s heart seemed to be pounding in their ears, matching along to the blood pumping from where their lower arm used to be. When their heart wasn’t deafening them, the alternate was; it was screaming about how sorry it was and how hungry it is and how it’s not its fault, how he did this to it, he was to blame when it “just wanted to help”. Who “he” was, Gabriel didn’t know and didn’t think they wanted to. Not when the pleading creature damn near killed them and ripped part of their fucking arm off.

And breathe. Despite how fucking hard it was to do that right now. Gabriel had to force themself to take deeper breaths than the shallow ones a panic attack caused, yet the alternate’s rambling would knock their concentration and start it up again.

“I’m sorry! I’m so sorry, I’m-so hungry-where did you go? Don’t leave me alone again, please, don’t leave me alone again...”

‘Just let me leave.’ Gabriel fought the urge to bite their lip until it bled as they shuffled away from their pathetic hiding spot behind a wall. ‘Please, lord, let me leave.’

The alternate’s own stumbling footsteps hid Gabriel’s as they went for the front door. They were convinced they were free and clear, leading to them picking up speed.

They hit a can with their foot.

Their blood ran cold as it noisily rolled across the tile floor of the house’s kitchen. For a moment, neither being made a sound; so Gabriel chanced taking another step foreword. The sound put the alternate in motion and Gabriel barely made it out of the room when they were flattened and struggling to keep teeth away from their neck with only one hand. The alternate’s speech was gibberish now, straight-up shrieking in Gabriel’s ears like an excited, starving dog. The lieutenant's hand shaking only made them more sure that they were seconds away from death. Part of them already threw in the towel and almost let their hand slip off the alternate’s teeth-

“HEY, UGLY!”

The alternate jerked away from Gabriel’s neck and looked up. The creature used Gabriel’s collarbone as a launching point, leaving them to curl up in pain for a moment as a dull crack came from whoever the alternate impacted with. 

Someone started nudging them to try and get their attention. “Get up,” they urged them, their voice low but shaky. “Come on! Blunt force trauma isn’t gonna keep him down forever, get up!”

Gabriel tried, to their credit. Apparently they weren’t fast enough for their rescuer, who pulled them the rest of the way to their feet by their shirt collar (ow) and shoved them towards the door. “Get out of here. I’m gonna give that guy someone in better shape to chase aft-oh, fuck.” Gabriel swayed on their feet when they turned around. A man they were somewhat familiar with by now stood with a shotgun in his hands, staring at where their arm now ended. The alternate behind him was now on its feet and crouched as if ready to lunge. Luckily for Seth, apparently he could read eye signals. He’d barely made eye contact with Gabriel for a minute before turning around and catching the alternate’s teeth with his gun. They got caught in a scuffle for a moment until Seth managed to wrench his gun away again and slam the business end of it into the alternate’s neck, making it stumble back and giving him enough time to grab Gabriel’s shoulder and practically drag them out the door.

“I need a hospital-”

“Later.” Seth practically threw them into the side of a white van, which they did not appreciate. “Get in.”

“I’m not bleeding to death in a shitty white van!”

“Would you rather bleed to death between the jaws of that animal?”

There was a loud crash, the sound of something throwing itself against a heavy wooden door. Gabriel’s blood- and saliva-covered hand slipped on the passenger-side door’s hand before they caught it and threw it open.

The van was in motion almost as soon as the door was closed again, flying out onto the road. Gabriel tried to gather their wits and ignore the steady bleeding from the stump, watching the world go by the window.

Seth was the first to break the silence. “Are you okay? Besides the obvious.”

“Oh, yeah, I just love bleeding all over a strange cunt’s van.”

“Having a sense of humour is a good sign.”

Gabriel chose to ignore that in favour of focusing on their stomach churning. “Where are we going.”

“Well the hospital is a good thirty minute drive away, but the apartment is less than five. Pick one.”

“Do you know how to stop a stump from bleeding out?”

“I’ve had practice.”

Gabriel glanced back at Seth. He didn’t return the favour.

‘Not going to ask about that.’

“How did you know someone was in there?”

“You’re talking pretty casually for someone who lost half his arm.”

“I’m trying to stay awake.” Gabriel shuddered when their voice hit a higher pitch. This isn’t good. “Either I keep talking or you drive to the hospital with a dead body.”

“You were screaming bloody murder. I didn’t-had I known specifically that it was you, I would have left you there.”

Seth cringed at his own words. Gabriel raised an eyebrow. “Would you have.”

“I...Don’t know.”

An awkward silence. The Christmas lights they occasionally drove by cast brief rainbows over the two and painted Gabriel’s bloodied stump in pretty colours.

They’re cold, tired and discombobulated. The van’s warm as Hell. Falling asleep now means death, but they were struggling to keep their eyes open.

“Gabriel.”

Seth’s eyebrow furrowed in confusion when he glanced at them. “My name,” they specified. “It’s Gabriel.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“I don’t know. In case you need to identify me, I guess.”

“That’s a comforting thing to think of.”

“I’m cold.”

Seth didn’t respond to that, though the van noticeably was picking up speed as Gabriel’s world faded despite their will to stay awake.

-

The last thing they expected was to wake up again, let alone on a ratty couch in a just as ratty apartment. Their brain felt too big for their head and the rest of their body felt like it was made of stuffing.

They tried putting a hand to their head, only to find their arm ended sooner than they remembered. Their brain pounded as they fought to knit together memories that seemed incredibly elusive. Almost the entire last evening was completely lost on them.

“Oh hey, you’re awake!”

Another person walking into their field of vision broke their concentration. He crouched down beside them, a respectable distance away, and gave them a small, worried smile. “How’re you feeling?”

“Like shit.”

“Yeah, he said that you would.” The stranger rubbed the back of his neck. “You uh-got really lucky.”

“Oh, is th’ bastard up?”

“Sarah!”

Another person walked over, this one a lot less respectful of Gabriel’s personal space. Her smile was also a lot less friendly. “Hi.”

The first person Gabriel had been speaking to yanked Sarah back by her shoulder and began scolding her, despite the fact she clearly wasn’t listening. Gabriel covered their eyes with their remaining arm and decided to try sleeping off their “I feel like a stuffed animal” feeling.

They can deal with their new surroundings later.