145 Nassau Street #4E

On the night of January 31, 1882, fire tore through Orlando B. Potter's World Building at 37 Park Row, a warren of printing firms and newspaper offices fed by ink and press grease. Twelve people died. Within two weeks Potter announced he would rebuild on the same corner, this time absolutely fireproof, and commissioned Norris G. Starkweather, an architect whose own offices had burned in the old building. Ground broke in April 1883; the eleven-story Potter Building was finished in June 1886 at a cost of $1.2 million.

Starkweather sheathed the building's ironwork in ornamental terra cotta, the first such use in New York, over brick walls forty inches thick at the street. Potter believed in the material enough to found the New York Architectural Terra Cotta Company, which took space in the finished building alongside the New York Observer, The Press, and the headquarters of Otis Elevator. The building went co-op in 1980, and in 1996 the Landmarks Preservation Commission designated it, citing some of the "handsomest brickwork in New York City."

Apartment 4E holds 1,600 square feet on the fourth floor: two bedrooms plus a home office (the prior listing ran it as a third bedroom), two baths, and ceilings at eleven feet. The kitchen is wrapped in Calacatta Viola marble around a Bertazzoni gas range, the second bath holds a Zuma soaking tub, and the loft keeps its crown moldings, hardwood floors, and oversized windows, with in-unit laundry, video intercom, and private storage. The 41-unit co-op offers a twelve-month lease from mid-September, renewal option included, with formal sublet approval by the board.

The Potter Building fills its block between Park Row, Beekman, and Nassau Streets, facing City Hall Park across the stretch once called Newspaper Row, where the Times, Tribune, and World all printed within shouting distance. The old New York Times Building of 1889 still stands at 41 Park Row, now Pace University, and Temple Court of 1883, now the Beekman hotel, sits a block away on Beekman Street. From the landscaped roof deck the view runs from the Woolworth Building's crown to the Empire State, and the Fulton Center transit hub is a short walk east.

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