Alva Vanderbilt hired the architect Richard Morris Hunt to design her Châteauesque ‘petit chateau’ which became one in the long line of mansions along Fifth Avenue called Vanderbilt Row by the press.
The mansion was completed in 1883, and on March 26 she threw a huge costume ball to celebrate.
I believe that the mansion above may not be the Petite Chateau; I could be wrong but I’m pretty sure that is the Cornelius Vanderbilt House that was a couple blocks up on the corner of 57th Street.
Hi Ed — Thank you very much for bringing this to my attention. I try hard to keep accurate notes on architectural photographs, but may well have misstepped here. I’ll see if I can figure out where I went wrong.
Hope you found other things of interest here.
best
rosina/sara