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NewYork&People guide
Top 9 locations in Midtown West, New York
byAleksei Krasilevskii
Live update: Updated October 5, 2021Copy link
Copy link1. Carnegie Hall
PEOPLE ARE SAYING:
Aleksei KrasilevskiiCarnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States. It is located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east side of Seventh Avenue between West 56th and 57th Streets, two blocks south of Central Park.
Designed by architect William Burnet Tuthill and built by philanthropist Andrew Carnegie in 1891, it is one of the most prestigious venues in the world for both classical music and popular music. Carnegie Hall has its own artistic programming, development, and marketing departments, and presents about 250 performances each season. It is also rented out to performing groups. The hall has not had a resident company since 1962, when the New York Philharmonic moved to Lincoln Center's Philharmonic Hall (renamed Avery Fisher Hall in 1973 and David Geffen Hall in 2015).
Carnegie Hall has 3,671 seats, divided among its three auditoriums.
2. City Spire Center
PEOPLE ARE SAYING:Aleksei Krasilevskii CitySpire Center is a skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on the south side of West 56th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues. Designed by Helmut Jahn and completed in 1987, it is 814 feet (248 m) tall and has 75 floors, with a total area of 359,000 square feet (33,400 m2). The building is owned by Tishman Speyer Properties.
The CitySpire Center is the 25th-tallest building in New York City and the 42nd tallest in the United States. When completed, the CitySpire Center was the second tallest concrete tower in the United States after the Willis Tower in Chicago.[ CitySpire Center is part of a cluster of tall buildings near 57th Street and Seventh Avenue, along with Carnegie Hall Tower, the Metropolitan Tower and One57.
The bottom 23 floors of the tower are for commercial use and above it are luxury apartments, which are larger on higher floors. The Moorish-inspired dome, which is a homage to the adjacent New York City Center on West 55th Street, is illuminated at night with a white light. The building is octagonal in shape.
Soon after the building's completion, residents of nearby buildings complained of hearing a loud whistling noise which, it later turned out, came from the wind blowing through the decorative dome at the building's top. The city threatened daily fines for the noise, which lasted for more than a year. Developers silenced the whistle by removing every other louver in the cooling tower, thereby widening the narrow channels through which the wind whistled. Some time around completion, it was revealed that the building exceeded its height limit by around 14 feet (4 m). The developers compensated for this violation by agreeing to build dance studio space for the city's Department of Cultural Affairs on an adjacent site.
3. St. Thomas Church
PEOPLE ARE SAYING:Aleksei KrasilevskiiSaint Thomas Church is an Episcopal parish church of the Episcopal Diocese of New York at 53rd Street and Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Also known as Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue or Saint Thomas Church in the City of New York, it was incorporated on January 9, 1824. The current structure, completed in 1914, is the fourth church built to house this congregation and was designed by the architects Ralph Adams Cram and Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue in the French High Gothic Revival style.[
The church is home to the Saint Thomas Choir of Men and Boys, a choral ensemble comprising men and boys which performs music of the Anglican tradition at worship services and offers a full concert series during the course of the year. The boys of the Saint Thomas Choir (as the men are professional singers) are enrolled at the Saint Thomas Choir School, the only church-affiliated residential choir school in the United States.
4. Central Park Tower
PEOPLE ARE SAYING:Aleksei KrasilevskiiCentral Park Tower, also known as the Nordstrom Tower, is a residential supertall skyscraper along Billionaires' Row on 57th Street in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Designed by Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture, the building rises 1,550 feet (472 m) and is the second-tallest skyscraper in the United States and the Western Hemisphere, the 13th tallest building in the world, the tallest residential building in the world, and the tallest building outside Asia by roof height.
Central Park Tower was developed by Extell Development Company and Shanghai Municipal Investment Group. The lowest floors of the building contain a large Nordstrom store, the first in New York City. The eastern portion of the tower contains a cantilever above the Art Students League of New York's building at 215 West 57th Street, intended to maximize views of nearby Central Park. The residential portion of the tower contains 179 condominiums. In total, Central Park Tower cost $3 billion to construct.
The site of Central Park Tower was formerly occupied by two buildings at 225 West 57th Street and 1780 Broadway, which were demolished in 2011–2012. Despite uncertainty about the final design and complications relating to the tower's financing, excavations at the site started in May 2014, and actual construction started in February 2015. There were several incidents and controversies during the building's construction, including a controversy over the tower's cantilever and the death of a security guard. The building topped out during September 2019, with a projected completion date of late 2020.
5. Steinway Tower
PEOPLE ARE SAYING:Aleksei KrasilevskiiSteinway Tower, is a supertall residential skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Developed by JDS Development Group and Property Markets Group, it is situated along Billionaires' Row on the north side of 57th Street near Sixth Avenue. 111 West 57th Street consists of two sections: Steinway Hall, a 16-story former Steinway & Sons store at the building's base designed by Warren and Wetmore, and a newer 84-story, 1,428-foot (435-meter) tower adjacent to Steinway Hall, designed by SHoP Architects.
111 West 57th Street has 60 luxury condominiums: 14 in Steinway Hall and 46 in the tower. The residential tower has a glass facade with piers made of terracotta, and contains a pinnacle with setbacks on the southern side. When completed, the tower will be one of the tallest buildings in the United States, as well as the thinnest skyscraper in the world with a width-to-height ratio of about 1:24. Steinway Hall, a New York City designated landmark, contains a facade made mostly of brick, limestone, and terracotta, and was restored as part of the residential development. 111 West 57th Street contains numerous resident amenities, housed mostly in the building's base, as well as a large rotunda within Steinway Hall that is also a designated city landmark.
Steinway Hall opened in 1925 and served as a store, recital hall, and office building for almost nine decades. Plans for a residential skyscraper on the site date to 2005, with proposals for residential towers at 105–107 West 57th Street, adjacent to Steinway Hall. JDS acquired the lots at 105–107 West 57th Street in March 2012, and JDS and Property Markets Group purchased Steinway Hall the next year, giving them the lots at 109–113 West 57th Street. Work on the tower and on Steinway Hall's renovation began in 2014. The development has faced several challenges, including financing difficulties, numerous lawsuits, and controversies over employment. The tower's concrete form topped out during April 2019, and the development is expected to be completed by 2021.
6. 53W53
PEOPLE ARE SAYING:Aleksei Krasilevskii53 West 53 (also known as the MoMA Expansion Tower and 53 West 53rd Street, and formerly known as Tower Verre) is a supertall skyscraper located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, adjacent to the Museum of Modern Art. It was constructed by the real estate companies Hines, Pontiac Land Group and Goldman Sachs. 53W53 is 1,050 feet (320 m) tall.
The building had been in development since 2006, but was delayed for several years due to disputes over the design and difficulties in securing financing. Construction began in late 2014. It was officially topped out in August 2018 and completed the next year. As of November 2019, 53 West 53 is the Tenth-tallest completed building in the city.
7. Museum of Modern Art
PEOPLE ARE SAYING:Aleksei KrasilevskiiMuseum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of the largest and most influential museums of modern art in the world.[ MoMA's collection offers an overview of modern and contemporary art, including works of architecture and design, drawing, painting, sculpture, photography, prints, illustrated books and artist's books, film, and electronic media.
The MoMA Library includes approximately 300,000 books and exhibition catalogs, more than 1,000 periodical titles, and more than 40,000 files of ephemera about individual artists and groups. The archives hold primary source material related to the history of modern and contemporary art.
ALSO FEATURED IN:Top 50 locations in New York City
8. Radio City Music Hall
PEOPLE ARE SAYING:Aleksei KrasilevskiiRadio City Music Hall is an entertainment venue at 1260 Avenue of the Americas, within Rockefeller Center, in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. Nicknamed the Showplace of the Nation, it is the headquarters for the Rockettes, the precision dance company. Radio City Music Hall was designed by Edward Durell Stone and Donald Deskey in the Art Deco style.
Radio City Music Hall was built on a plot of land that was originally intended for a Metropolitan Opera House, although plans for the opera house were canceled in 1929. It opened on December 27, 1932, as part of the construction of Rockefeller Center. The 5,960-seat Music Hall was the larger of two venues built for Rockefeller Center's "Radio City" section, the other being Center Theatre. It was largely successful until the 1970s, when declining patronage nearly drove the Music Hall to bankruptcy. Radio City Music Hall was designated a New York City Landmark in May 1978, and the Music Hall was restored and allowed to remain open. The hall was extensively renovated in 1999.
One of the more notable parts of the Music Hall is its large auditorium, which was the world's largest when the Hall first opened. The Music Hall also contains a variety of art. Although Radio City Music Hall was initially intended to host stage shows, it hosted performances in a film-and-stage-spectacle format through the 1970s, and was the site of several movie premieres. It now primarily hosts concerts, including by leading pop and rock musicians, and live stage shows such as the Radio City Christmas Spectacular. The Music Hall has also hosted televised events including the Grammy Awards, the Tony Awards, the Daytime Emmy Awards, the MTV Video Music Awards, and the NFL Draft.
9. SPYSCAPE
PEOPLE ARE SAYING:Aleksei KrasilevskiiSpyscape is a private, for-profit espionage museum and experience in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It opened in February 2018 to a positive reception from local and international media. It features seven main experience zones, as well as a James Bond exhibition, 007xSpyscape.
The 60,000-square-foot museum & experience was created by Archimedia, a London-based private investment group and developer of resorts and leisure attractions, at a cost of “tens of millions of dollars.” The "dark, labyrinthine interior" was designed by David Adjaye and occupies two levels inside a glass box building in midtown Manhattan.
The gallery themes include: Encryption, which focuses on the cryptanalysts who cracked the German Enigma machine in WWII; Deception, which takes visitors through the FBI’s hunt for KGB mole Robert Hanssen; Surveillance, a 360-degree room that presents a closer look at Edward Snowden; Hacking, an emoji-filled gallery highlighting the Anonymous (group); Cyberwarfare, which focus on Stuxnet; Special Ops, which focuses on WWII spy gadgets and SOE Officer Virginia Hall; and Intelligence, which examines the how espionage and analysis shaped the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Visitors have the opportunity to test their own skills with various ‘challenges’ throughout the galleries - assessing traits from empathy and agility, to personality, brain power, and risk tolerance. The final gallery is Debrief, where visitors receive the results of their tests and challenges, and are assigned a spy role.
Driven: 007xSpyscape - the first official James Bond exhibit in New York City - opened March 2019 in Spyscape’s south gallery. The focal point of the exhibit is the actual Aston Martin DB5 that was driven by Pierce Brosnan in the film GoldenEye. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, Spyscape made the 007xSpyscape exhibition available for free online following the temporary closure of the NYC venue.
In April 2020, Spyscape released a podcast series, True Spies, narrated by Hayley Atwell and Vanessa Kirby. True Spies provides a unique insight into the world of espionage, asking listeners what they’d do in real life spy situations. The series also invites listeners to test their own spy skills, with exercises designed by a former Head of Training at British Intelligence.
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