The Grand Madison

The Grand Madison at two hundred twenty-five Fifth Avenue stands as a physical record of the shifting identity of the neighborhood. Before this structure rose in nineteen hundred seven, the site was occupied by the original Brunswick Hotel, a premier destination for nineteenth-century socialites and wealthy travelers from England. The hotel served as the headquarters for the New York Coaching Club, a group of affluent men whose primary recreation involved driving teams of four horses in choreographed displays. When the hotel closed in eighteen ninety-six, the site briefly hosted the home of a prominent homeopathic physician before the current thirteen-story building was constructed to replace the aging residential hotels that once defined the area around Madison Square Park.