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Top 10 Most Beautiful Residential Lobbies in New York City

Lobbies in many of NYC's apartment buildings pack in a lot of surprises; no Plain-Jane-Brown-Paper-Wrapper spaces are these! We're talking gilded mosaic barrel vaults conjuring St. Mark’s in Venice, and angled, multi-level spaces with soaring atriums and babbling brooks. Also expect to find huge coat rooms overlooking gardens and the East River, and cavernous halls fit for pharaohs!

#1 - The Osborne, 205 West 57th Street

Co-op in Midtown West

The gilded and vaulted ceiling of the large lobby in this seemingly dark, labyrinthine, brownstone palace that probably has hosted Aladdin is the most impressive residential entrance in the city.



#2 - The Galleria, 117 East 57th Street

Condo in Midtown East

One is irresistibly sucked up into the stunning residential lobby of this mid-block, mixed-use building, or magnetically drawn down into the tall office atrium as the two are separated by a rakishly angled, dramatic and large glass planting vitrine.



#3 - 1158 Fifth Avenue

Co-op in Carnegie Hill

This otherwise demure and nice pre-war apartment building has an absolutely glorious, yes fantastic, vaulted Adamesque lobby.


#4 - River House, 435 East 52nd Street

Co-op in Beekman/Sutton Place

Enter this inner sanctum of New York's most elite and impressive residential building and you find the usual concierge desk, glorious garden, river views, and, most importantly, large cloak rooms to accommodate the evening's splendid parties.



#5 - 1 Sutton Place South

Co-op in Beekman/Sutton Place

Bereft of its yacht moorings since the FDR Drive was built, residents here must do with a triple-arch driveway leading to a lobby overlooking a large garden and the East River.



#6 - 1088 Park Avenue

Co-op in Carnegie Hill

Plastics may have been a big thing in the 1960s, but transparency rules here with its vistas of a large garden through the entrance's arched, double-height windows. 



#7 - The Corinthian, 330 East 38th Street

Condo in Murray Hill

The vast interior of this lobby could probably accommodate an attractive blimp and surprisingly it does not hint at the impressive cylindricality of this huge, free-standing residential tower.



#8 - Butterfield House, 37 West 12th Street

Co-op in Greenwich Village

This quite modern and modest apartment building is across from a large, lush church garden and respectfully does not break the mood with its own serene, Zen-like lobby garden.



#9 - The Paterno, 440 Riverside Drive

Co-op in Morningside Heights

Although this great pre-war apartment buildings on Riverside Drive broadly curves into Claremont Avenue, its impressive lobby is simply square and unquestionably impressively large. 



#10 - 1016 Fifth Avenue

Co-op in Carnegie Hill

There may be a few nearby palatial, pre-war, limestone residential buildings of note, but here is an exquisite and exceedingly elegant and unusual gray marble lobby fit for connoisseurs.