Garden City Executive Center
(1581 Franklin Ave.)
The year 2015 marks the 90th anniversary of the laying of the cornerstone of the Garden City Executive Center on the corner of Old Country Road and Franklin Avenue in Garden City. The center was commissioned by Title Guarantee & Trust Company in the early 1920s as its Nassau County headquarters. At the time, Title Guarantee had designs on opening the building as a bank, but pressure from its main clients, Wall Street banks, convinced them otherwise.
The architect, H. Craig Severance, was at one time partners with William Van Alen, who designed the Chrysler Building. Severance went onto have the more successful career designing buildings to help brand different companies. Among them were the Bank of the United States, the Taft Hotel, the Montague Court Building, the Coca-Cola Building, and his most prominent building, 40 Wall St., now the Trump Tower.
40 Wall St. was built for the Bank of Manhattan Trust, which later merged with Chase Bank and became known as the Chase Manhattan Trust Company. 40 Wall Street is known as the “Crown Jewel of Wall Street” and Garden City itself has its own “Crown Jewel” on Franklin Avenue, the Garden City Executive Center.
Construction of the Chrysler Building, 40 Wall St., the Singer Building, the Woolworth Building and the Empire State Building were part of the golden age of architects trying to outdo each other by building the world’s tallest skyscrapers in order to bring attention to their client’s brand. Much of the building took place as a result of two major transportation events: the completion of Grand Central Station and subway service to lower Manhattan.
The Garden City Executive Center was completely gut rehabbed in 1996 by the U.S. Trust Company under the supervision of Mancini & Duffy, one of New York’s leading architectural firms. The building is on one of the busiest intersections in Nassau County and was appraised as having “incalculable advertising value” because of its unique location and signage.
The building was completed shortly after Teddy Roosevelt opened the Nassau County Courthouse named for him, directly across the street. Because of the building’s unique structure, it was approved as an official fall-out shelter during the Cold War.
Today, the Garden City Executive Center is truly the crown jewel of Franklin Avenue, and one of Nassau County’s outstanding buildings of historical significance that has been renovated in the finest traditions of the golden era in which it was built.
For further information, contact Neil Creedon and Maria Valanzano of Colliers International at 516-328-6500, or by email at neil.creedon@colliers.com, and maria.valanzano@colliers.com.
