This residence is located in one of the finest historic apartment buildings in New York's Greenwich Village. Completed in 1883, the building is known as the Apthorp; its apartments have eleven-foot ceilings and wonderfully spacious proportions.

Despite its location in such a distinguished building, the apartment was in very poor condition. A substantial amount of the original detail had been destroyed over the years; walls were barren of moldings, floors were damaged, inappropriate track lighting covered the ceilings, and the apartment was without satisfactory kitchen, bathroom, guest room or sitting room.

The apartment was rebuilt to create of the front three rooms a series of spaces en suite which can be opened into one another or closed off as desired with quarter sawn oak sliding doors. These rooms consist of the living room with tall double windows facing south - a light and airy room entered from the front hall; the sitting room, an interior space of darker colors to contrast with the living room; and the master bedroom, another space of light and open proportions.

The front hall leads to a second series of three spaces at the rear of the apartment, also designed in an en suite arrangement, consisting of the dining room with its apsidal end, a completely reconstructed center section comprising the kitchen and bathroom, and a guest room or study at the far end. Gridded sliding doors separate the spaces

The overall style of the apartment is Edwardian in the front, but Modern in the back. An English flavor is maintained throughout the design and a number of the owner's English antiques and family pieces were incorporated into the rooms.

The living room combines ivory, cream and white fabrics, antique wicker furniture and English silverware to reflect light and enhance the feeling of airiness; the sitting room contrasts with golden oak finishes, dark greens and rusts in the walls and carpets and umber rattan chairs to create the atmosphere of a gentlemen's club. The dining room is a cool pale green with celadon moldings which leads to the kitchen and guest room. These spaces are finished in white and cream, with the kitchen occupying a gridded cube of ribbed glass at the center of the composition.