News December 2024

Lobby and lower level, Whitney Museum (former), Marcel Breuer and Hamiltion Smith, 1966. Photo: John Arbuckle
Staircase, view looking south, Whitney Museum (former), Marcel Breuer and Hamilton Smith, 1966. Photo: John Arbuckle
Lower level, Whitney Museum (former), Marcel Breuer and Hamilton Smith, 1966. Photo: John Arbuckle.
Lobby lighting, Whitney Museum (former), Marcel Breuer and Hamilton Smith, 1966. Photo: Samantha Marsden.

DOCOMOMO Works to Protect the Interiors of Breuer’s Former Whitney Museum

December 15, 2024

The former Whitney Museum of American Art at 945 Madison, designed by Marcel Breuer and his partner Hamilton Smith and completed in 1966, has recently been sold to Sotheby’s. The auction house plans to make it their New York headquarters and has retained Herzog & de Meuron to renovate it for them. With a change in ownership and a change in use, we fear that portions of Breuer’s original interior could be permanently and unsympathetically altered.

945 Madison Avenue is within the New York City Upper East Side Historic District so any changes to the exterior need to be approved by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC). The seminal interiors of this landmark—probably the best known by this Bauhaus master and among the most significant works of Modern architecture in the city—are not protected by agency oversight and currently could be inappropriately altered without recourse. Well preserved until now, the public interior spaces, an integral part of the overall design, were painstakingly restored in 2015–2016 by Beyer Blinder Belle.

After the Whitney relocated to the Meat Packing District in 2015, the building was leased for four years by the Metropolitan Museum, who named it the Met Breuer. Following the Met, it was occupied for three years by the Frick Museum, as the Frick Madison, until March 2024.

After learning last year that Breuer’s building would be sold after the Frick departed, DOCOMOMO US/New York Tri-State in collaboration with Docomomo US, submitted a 45-page Request for Evaluation on December 21, 2023, requesting that the Commission consider designating the former Whitney Museum as an Interior Landmark. That document was primarily researched by preservationist Thomas Collins.

Since the submission we have built a broad coalition, now comprised of six other leading local, state and national organizations, which have all submitted letters to the LPC in support of our RFE. Those organizations are: 

  • Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts
  • Historic Districts Council
  • Municipal Art Society
  • New York Landmarks Conservancy
  • Preservation League of New York State
  • Society of Architectural Historians (national) Heritage Conservation Committee

We have also recently received the support of Community Board 8 Manhattan, whose Upper East Side territory includes 945 Madison. DOCOMOMO US/New York Tri-State President John Arbuckle prepared and presented a Powerpoint presentation on November 18 via Zoom to the CB8 Landmarks Committee, who voted unanimously to support our request for support. Rather than writing a letter, the CB8 Landmarks Committee presented a resolution to the full Community Board at its November 20 meeting. The Board voted over 80 percent in favor to approve the resolution that “Community Board 8 encourage the Landmarks Preservation Commission to preserve interiors of 945 Madison Avenue through an Interior Landmark Designation.” Read the resolution.

We were glad to see that the LPC announced on Friday December 13 that the agenda for its Tuesday December 17 meeting will include votes on whether to calendar the former Whitney as an interior landmark and, whether to calendar it as an individual landmark as well. When the LPC calendars a site, the site is officially considered as a landmark and any proposed alterations must be approved by the LPC, just as if the site was already designated. Calendaring provides important interim protection. If the LPC votes to calendar on Tuesday they will then have a full public hearing, probably in a few months, at which the commissioners will vote whether or not the site should be designated an interior and/or individual landmark.
We hope that the LPC will vote to calendar the former Whitney as both an interior landmark and as an individually designated landmark. Stay tuned.