Landmarks Everywhere #7
It’s been a while since I have written my newsletter. I realized that I put a little too much pressure on myself to publish something coherent and well-curated, and this newsletter is mostly to share the little beauties of the everyday landmarks that I stumble upon.
It has always made me sad to see beautiful buildings abandoned. Today, I walked near a castle-like storefront marked “building for sale.” I wrote a note to myself: Scheffel Hall, since that was one of the words marked on its exterior. I first noticed it because of the big yellow “for sale” sign, but then its decor really stood out to me and I couldn’t stop looking at the infinite amount of details this building presented. The top of the facade is full of swirls that look like rose petals. On the very top is a circle with gold trimmings that I had a really difficult time photographing. The gold glistened in the sun, and I made a wish for its future.
When I got home, I found that the only review on its Google Map location is by a self-proclaimed “local guide.” She wrote:
“Scheffel Hall at 190 Third Avenue in the Gramercy Park neighborhood of Manhattan was built in 1894-1895 at a time when the area south of it was known as Kleinedeutschland (“Little Germany”). The building, which served as a beer hall and restaurant, was modeled after an early 17th century building in Heidelberg Castle, the Friedrichsbau, and was named after Joseph Viktor von Scheffel, a German poet and novelist. The building’s style has been described as German-American eclectic Renaissance Revival.
In addition to attracting a German clientele, the restaurant was popular with the politicians, artists, and writers living in the Gramercy Park-Stuyvesant Square area.
16 Among the noted writers that the WPA Guide to New York records "quaffed its foaming pilsner," were critic James Huneker, poet-short-story writer H. C. Bunner, and author Brander Mathews. 17 In 1909, 0 . Henry [William Sydney Porter] set his story "The Halberdier of the Little Rheinschloss," at Scheffel Hall which he called "Old Munich," describing "the big hall with its smoky rafters, rows of imported steins, portrait of Goethe, and verses painted on the walls..”
I was also glad to find out that this building is on the official landmarks of New York.
Above is a photograph I took of the Scheffel Hall, and below is a photograph I found online of the Heidelberg Castle, the castle that the architecture was modeled after.
I also found an image online of the building in 2013, when it was a Pilates studio, with the old interior still untouched:
