J. Pierpont Morgan commissioned the Library during an age of conspicuous opulence among his affluent peers. The new building cost him just over $1,011,000 (about $32 million today)— a figure that does not include his purchases of two houses that were demolished to create the large lot. This photograph depicts the Library (center) and the Morgans’ Manhattan home at the corner of 36th Street and Madison Avenue (far left).
Though the Library is stylistically distinct from the structures around it, Morgan insisted it be of an appropriate scale for the relatively residential neighborhood of Murray Hill. From the sidewalk, passersby could (and still can) look up to the light, spare, elegant facade, a testament to the skill of the many designers, artists, stone setters, carvers, and builders who brought the bookman’s paradise into being.
J. Pierpont Morgan’s Library, before 1924. Museum of the City of New York, X2010.18.286.