Twin Peaks

Art & Culture | History

Historical Row House Restored in an Artsy Fashion

twin peaks building side greenwich village pop culture

About Twin Peaks

 & why it made the Carpe City list

  • The building, now known as Twin Peaks, is a phantasmagorical 1925 restoration of a plain-old1830s row house. 
    • It has been described as a wonderfully ludicrous mock half-timbered fantasy row-house castle,” and it is modeled on a Swiss chalet. 
  • Greenwich Village in the 1920s was quirky, and Twin Peaks reflects that artistic flair.  
  • In 1925, builder Clifford Reed Daily converted the row house into the medieval Swiss chalet that housed ten artists’ studio apartments.  
    • When the building was dedicated in 1926, it sported a rainbow paint job, and offerings to the god Pan were made on the roof, while the actress Helen Hays tossed flowers to onlookers on the street below!  
    • The buildings were also sprinkled with holy water and doused in “pre-Napoleon” champagne!  

Carpe City Trivia

The building was cream with brown trim since the mid-20th Century, but in 2017, it was repainted to the grey and white you see now.

This is wildly unpopular; locals call the paint job “surreally bad.” Landmark preservation organizations in the Village are fighting to have it changed back! 

By: Lucie Levine

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