Many of us are familiar with Fifth Avenue between 42nd and 57th Streets. We typically don’t think much of it, as today it's lined with skyscrapers housing corporate offices with high-end retail on the ground floor. It has always intrigued me because prior to the 1920's, this is where you could find many elaborate mansions of the city’s elite.

The Stevens-Whitney Mansion is a forgotten relic that doesn't often get mentioned due to its neighbor, The Vanderbilt Mansion.

When Frederick Stevens wed Adele Sampson, it was not well-received. Although Frederick came from an old, Long Island family, he wasn’t very well-off in the eyes of New York Society…until Adele inherited her wealthy father’s estate and became one of the richest women in America. Her father, Joseph Sampson, was one of the founders of Chemical Bank.

In 1875, Stevens and Sampson laid plans for their new mansion on 57th Street and Fifth Avenue. Adele bought the vacant lot for $250,000 ($6,750,000 today). Just for the lot! Cornelieus Vanderbilt wouldn’t actually build his massive compound across the street for another two years.

Completed a year later, The New York Times reported, “no expense was spared in the construction, or in its interior decorations and furnishings. One room was furnished entirely from the contents of an old Norman mansion.”

Things went south for the family in 1882 when Adele had an affair with the Marquis de Talleyrand-Perigord. He had arrived in New York City penniless, and Fredrick had offered to help him. Fredrick gave the Marquis a room in his mansion to stay, which I suppose you could say didn’t end well for old Fredrick... Adele fled to Europe with the Marquis, was blacklisted from New York Society, and sold the mansion for $600,000 to Mrs. William Whitney.

William Whitney would soon become Secretary of the Navy, and the mansion would host notable guests such as Grover Cleveland, the Cooper-Hewitt's, the Stuyvesant Fishe's, and the Vanderbilt's. The Whitneys occupied the mansion for over a decade and in 1896, Henry Whitney (William’s son) married his next door neighbor and childhood playmate, Gertrude Vanderbilt. William would later gift them the house.

The mansion being demolished - *Photo from Library of Congress*

By 1909, things on Fifth Avenue were shifting and in 1919 the Whitney's sold 2 West 57th Street to August Heckscher. Designed by esteemed architectural firm Warren & Wetmore, the Heckscher Building would come to be known as the Crown Building.

Recently, the Crown Building recorded the biggest sale of the year in residential real estate. The Jala Penthouse sold for $74MM and is quite lavish—as you could imagine. Originally asking $83MM, I’m disappointed that the buyer’s agent was only able to knock $9MM off the price. I’m kidding, of course.

Photos Douglas Elliman

Here is Mansion Global’s coverage of the sale with some luxe interior images.

The Stevens-Whitney Mansion

Tudor City

The Ansonia