🏙️ New York City in 1905 | Flatiron Building What you’re seeing:
A reconstructed street view of the Flatiron Building in New York City around 1905. The camera looks down a cobblestone avenue with streetcar tracks, horse drawn wagons, early motorcars, and crowds in hats and coats, as the narrow wedge of the Flatiron rises where the streets meet. How did New York architecture get here?
For most of the 1800s New York grew with low brick and brownstone buildings, cast iron fronts, and dense tenement blocks. By the late 19th century, elevators and steel frames allowed true skyscrapers to rise in lower Manhattan. The Flatiron Building, completed in 1902 at Fifth Avenue and Broadway, was one of the first tall steel frame towers away from the financial district and helped push the skyline uptown. What was New York like in 1905?
New York had recently been consolidated into five boroughs and was becoming a global capital of finance, shipping, and communications. The first subway line had jus...