Stonehenge 58

Stonehenge 58 is a pre-war residential apartment building at 400 East 58th Street in the Sutton Place neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. Designed by architect George F. Pelham in the Tudor Revival architecture style and completed in 1929, the 16‑story building was one of several large apartment houses highlighted in contemporary reports on the East Side’s luxury housing boom.^[1][2] It is one of three George F. Pelham buildings in Sutton Place, the only in Tudor Revivial Style. The other two are 444 East 58th Street and 422 East 58th Street, both in Beaux-Arts architecture style.

Prior to the construction of Stonehenge 58, the site on East 58th Street was occupied by earlier residential properties. In June 1921, The New York Times reported on the sale of multiple parcels in the area, including property on East 58th Street that would later form part of the site of the present building.^[3]

Two months later, in August 1921, the Consolidated Gas Company sold additional parcels on East 58th Street, further consolidating the land that would eventually be redeveloped.^[4]

In January 1922, further transactions on East 58th Street were reported, reflecting continued assembly and trading of parcels in the area prior to redevelopment.^[5]

In May 1923, the Astor Estate sold a group of Manhattan properties, including holdings on East 58th Street, marking another step in the transfer of the parcels that would later be redeveloped as Stonehenge 58.^[6]

By June 1929, The New York Times reported that a new sixteen‑story Tudor‑style apartment house designed by Pelham was nearing completion at Sutton Place, with occupancy expected later that year.^[1] In September 1929, the building was cited as one of the major new East Side apartment houses ready for fall rentals, part of more than $90 million in new construction that season.^[2]

In June 1947, The New York Times reported that a real estate bond issue connected with the property was liquidated at 99.8 cents on the dollar, effectively resolving outstanding financial obligations tied to the building.^[7] This financial restructuring preceded the building’s sale the following year.

In June 1948, the property was sold to an investor for a reported $1,260,000, as noted in The New York Times.^[8] The sale reflected the postwar demand for well-located pre-war apartment houses in Midtown East.

Ownership later passed to Stonehenge NYC, which rebranded the property as "Stonehenge 58" and undertook renovations to update interiors and common spaces while retaining pre-war details.^[9]

The completion of Stonehenge 58 in 1929 coincided with the transformation of Sutton Place into one of Manhattan’s most fashionable residential enclaves. While Rosario Candela’s contemporaneous designs at One Sutton Place South (1927) and River House (1931) exemplified the Beaux-Arts and Neo-Georgian idioms favored by many luxury developers, Pelham’s Tudor Revival treatment at 400 East 58th Street stood out as an unusual stylistic choice for the neighborhood.^[1]

The building was also part of a larger wave of East Side apartment construction that The New York Times estimated at more than $90 million in 1929 alone.^[2] In this context, Stonehenge 58 illustrates both the diversity of architectural expression in Sutton Place and the scale of speculative luxury development that reshaped Midtown East in the late 1920s.

Stonehenge 58 was designed by George F. Pelham in the Tudor Revival style, as described in contemporaneous reports in The New York Times.^[1] The sixteen‑story structure features a brick and stone façade with Tudor‑inspired ornamentation, including stone trim, pointed arches, and decorative detailing around the entrance. Its massing is symmetrical, with modest setbacks that reflect zoning requirements of the late 1920s.

Interiors were marketed in 1929 as embodying the "gracious living" associated with Sutton Place, with layouts that emphasized foyers, windowed kitchens, and fireplaces.^[2] These features aligned with the expectations of affluent tenants seeking pre‑war luxury apartments, and distinguished the building from the more Beaux‑Arts and Neo‑Georgian designs of nearby Rosario Candela projects.

Although not individually designated as a landmark, Stonehenge 58 contributes to the architectural character of Sutton Place, illustrating both Pelham’s versatility and the stylistic diversity of the neighborhood’s late‑1920s apartment boom.

Later commentary has noted Stonehenge 58’s distinctive role within Sutton Place’s architectural mix. Writing in his Streetscapes column for The New York Times, architectural historian Christopher Gray observed that George F. Pelham’s work in the neighborhood was generally associated with Beaux-Arts and Renaissance Revival apartment houses, making the Tudor Revival treatment at 400 East 58th Street an unusual departure.^[10]

Gray and other commentators have emphasized that while Pelham was prolific, his work has often been overshadowed by contemporaries such as Rosario Candela. In this context, Stonehenge 58 has been cited as a rare example of Pelham experimenting with Tudor Revival motifs in a luxury high-rise setting, contributing to the stylistic diversity of Sutton Place.

Most of the building’s notable tenants were concentrated in its early decades (1929–1940s), reflecting its role as a hub for performing artists, émigré aristocrats, and socially prominent families.

• Mary Servoss (1895–1964), Broadway and film actress active in the 1920s and 1930s.^[11]
• James Gilkes (1907–1985), writer and Columbia University professor of English literature, known for his scholarship on 19th‑century poetry.^[12]
• James Cash Penney Jr. and his wife, actress Helen Snyder, part of the J. C. Penney retail family dynasty.^[13]
• Rosalind Stair, fashion model and society figure photographed for Vogue and other publications in the 1920s.^[14]
• Peter Chambers, Broadway and opera performer active in the 1920s and 1930s.^[13]
• Sascha Beaumont, Broadway actress of the 1920s.^[13]
• Ben Leavy (1892–1947), Broadway and film actor, best known for his role in The Front Page (1931).^[15]
• Eleanor Shaler (1900–1989), actress and singer who appeared in Broadway revues including The Garrick Gaieties (1925) and The Manhatters (1927).^[16]
• Barbara Walton and her husband Gelston Hardy, parents of architect Hugh Hardy (1932–2017).^[17]
• Eugene Lamb Richards III (1905–1984), financier and grandson of Henry Huttleston Rogers, co‑founder of Standard Oil.^[18]
• Harold Seton (1880s–1930s), society devotee, theater‑goer, and collector of photographs. He donated over 100 images of the 1883 Vanderbilt Ball to the New-York Historical Society, where his papers are preserved.^[19]
• Elizabeth Flournoy "Bessie" Johnson Mariani (1881–1936), daughter of reformist Cleveland mayor Tom L. Johnson. Active in the arts as an actress, singer, and writer, she was noted as the first woman in Cleveland to drive an automobile.^[20]
• Countess Irene Woronzow‑Daschkow, member of the Russian noble family Vorontsov‑Dashkov. Part of the émigré aristocracy that settled in New York after the Russian Revolution, she was married in a widely reported ceremony in Katonah, New York, in 1936.^[21]
• Leonard Dean, architect and designer. He was among those commissioned to design major units for the 1939 New York World's Fair.^[22]

• New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission; Dolkart, Andrew S.; Postal, Matthew A. (2009). Postal, Matthew A. (ed.). Guide to New York City Landmarks (4th ed.). New York: John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-0-470-28963-1. – Provides context on Sutton Place and the city’s pre-war apartment architecture.
• Gray, Christopher; Braley, Suzanne (2003). New York Streetscapes: Tales of Manhattan's Significant Buildings and Landmarks. Harry N. Abrams. ISBN 9780810944411. – Includes discussion of George F. Pelham’s work and the Sutton Place district.
• Office for Metropolitan History (Christopher Gray, ed.). Manhattan NB Database (1900–1986). – Comprehensive database of New York City building permits, including Pelham’s projects.
• Stern, Robert A. M.; Gilmartin, Patrick; Mellins, Thomas (1987). New York 1930: Architecture and Urbanism Between the Two World Wars. New York: Rizzoli. ISBN 978-0-8478-3096-1. OCLC 13860977. – Situates Stonehenge 58 within the broader East Side luxury apartment boom of the late 1920s.

• River House (New York City)
• One Sutton Place South
• Sutton Place, Manhattan
• Rosario Candela
• George F. Pelham