888 Madison Avenue may look like it was built for a 19th-century railroad tycoon, but it is actually a 21st century construction. Standing at the corner of Madison Avenue and 72nd Street, this Beaux-Arts building opened as a flagship location for Ralph Lauren in 2010. It stands on the same plot as a lost Vanderbilt home and complements an extant Gilded Age mansion right across the street (also a Ralph Lauren store).
This fake mansion sits on the site of a former McKim, Mead & White-designed home commissioned by Ruth Brown in 1893 and later owned by Alva Vanderbilt. Alva purchased the corner residence in 1895 after her divorce from William K. Vanderbilt. In this home, Alva hosted a wedding reception for her daughter, Consuelo Vanderbilt, on the occasion of her ill-fated marriage to the Duke of Marlborough.
After Alva, lawyer William Bayard Cutting and his family lived in the home. They sold the building in 1941 and it was demolished in 1951.
Weddle Gilmore Architects and HS2 Architecture incorporated elements of that original home and pieces of other late-19th- and early-20th-century mansions found on the Upper East Side when designing the Ralph Lauren store. The large blocks of Indiana limestone, hand-carved ornamentation, and intricate ironwork details on 888 Madison are reminiscent of the nearby James B. Duke House on Fifth Avenue and 78th Street and the mansion of Henry Clay Frick (now home to The Frick Collection).
The Duke House
American Tobacco Company founder James Buchanan Duke commissioned this private residence, built between 1909 and 1912, for his family. Today it houses New York University's Institute of Fine Arts.
Inside the Ralph Lauren store at 888 Madison, you’ll find Turkish marble floors, a grand staircase, shimmering chandeliers, and store displays that make you feel like you’re browsing through the closet of a fashionable heiress. The store houses the women's and home decor collections, as well as the popular Ralph’s Coffee.
Photo by Klaus-Peter Statz, The Rhinelander Mansion
You'll find the men's collection across the street inside the historic Rhinelander Mansion. Wealthy heiress Gertrude Rhinelander Waldo commissioned the massive home in 1894 but never lived in it. You can hear more of Gertrude’s story, see the fake mansion across the street, and uncover more real Gilded Age buildings on Untapped New York’s Gilded Age Mansions of Fifth Ave Walking Tour:
Fifth Ave Gilded Age Mansions Tour
Every Wednesday - Sunday: Admire the extant facades of Millionaire's Row and hear about the scandalous goings-on inside!
