Janes & Leo

The New York-based architectural firm of Elisha Harris Janes and Richard Leopold Leo (1871/72 — 26 September 1911), working as Janes & Leo from 1898 to 1911, designed and built numerous Beaux-Arts residential structures in New York City, both richly detailed row houses and luxury apartment blocks during the building boom that constructed Manhattan's Upper West Side. Neither Elisha Harris Janes nor Richard Leopold Leo ever studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, they worked within its traditions. Their most prominent structure is the ebullient Dorilton (1902), at Broadway and 71st Street, bolder and more sculptural than any professor at the École des Beaux-Arts would have encouraged. Schuyler Montgomery, the critic for the "Architectural Record" disapproved of its flamboyant appeal:

"It was a most questionable and question-provoking edifice in the guise of an apartment house. It not merely solicits but demands attention. It yells 'Come and look at me' so loud that the preoccupied or even the color blind can not choose but hear." [ [http://ci.columbia.edu/0240s/0243_2/0243_2_s3_2_text.html The Architecture and Development of New York City with Andrew S. Dolkart ] ]

Richard Leopold Leo was a graduate of the School of Architecture, Columbia University (1895). He built himself a house at Belle Harbor, Long Island, New York.He was a member of the Architectural League of New York. [ [http://www.sah.org/index.php?src=gendocs&ref=BiographiesArchitectsL&category=Resources Society of Architectural Hisorians. "s.v." "Richard Leopold Leo"] From obituary vol IX - 1911.] .

Like many contemporary firms, they often depended for repetitive sculptural details on mold-cast matte-glazed architectural terracotta imitating limestone; the firm's designers sculpted the model from which the casts were taken. [ [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9803E5DC1E3EE033A25757C1A9639C946096D6CF "New York Times", "Architectural Terracottaa Big Factor in New Building", May 14, 1911] Accessed 19 June 2008.]

elected commissions

*The Alimar (1899-1900), 925 West End Avenue at 105th Street, for Hamilton M. Weed. [ [http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/03/realestate/03scap.html "New York Times":Streetscapes: the Magic of the Alimar", February 3, 2008] ]
*The Manhasset (1901-05), Broadway between 108th and 109th Streets. Janes and Leo recast a design after the initial developer defaulted. [Andrew Dolkart, Matthew A. Postal, "Guide to New York City Landmarks" (New York Landmarks Preservation Commission) 2003:153.] Dark brick contrasted with limestone-colored architectural terracotta, a three-story almost vertical mansard roof. [ [http://www.nyc-architecture.com/UWS/UWS046.htm New York Architectural
] ]
*The Dorilton, for Hamilton M. Weed, 171 West 71st Street, at Broadway. Full-blown Beaux-Arts French Baroque, with monumental sculptures. [ [http://www.thecityreview.com/uws/bway/dorilton.html The Dorilton: photos and description] ]
*The Wellsmore, at 77th Street. Dark brick contrasted with limestone-colored architectural terracotta, which clads the first three storeys and providing window jambs, spandrels and entablatures.

Elisha H. Janes continued to practice after Leo's death. In 1913 he provided plans for remodelling in the Twenty-Second Regiment Armory, 67th to 68th Streets, between Columbus Avenue and Broadway (demolished). [ [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9D00E6D8163FE633A25756C2A9679C946296D6CF "New York Times", "The Real Estate Field", January 25, 1913] ] He formed a partnership with the German-American architect August William Cordes , whose previous partner, Theodore William Emile De Lemos, had died in 1909. [ [http://www.nyc.gov/html/lpc/downloads/pdf/reports/k&e.pdf Keuffel & Esser Company Building Designation Report "The Architects"] ] Their projects included the New York Women’s League for Animals Building (1913), 348-354 Lafayette Street, (now in the NoHo District) and Refrigeration Plant and Wholesale Market and Storage Buildings (1925-29) in Bronx Terminal Market, Hunts Point. [ [http://www.arch.columbia.edu/hp/studio/2003-2004/southernHistory.html History and Significance of the Southern Area ] ]

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