El Dorado (aka The Eldorado*) is among New York’s most fabled apartment buildings – for its celebrity residents as much as for its stunning twin-tower Art Deco architecture.
Despite (or because of?) the building’s impressive design, El Dorado (The Golden One) got off to a rocky start – foreclosure following the stock market crash. Though the apartments were luxe enough to include maid’s quarters, the building was economy-minded enough to use cast stone instead of the real thing in the three-story base. And original notations of gold leaf for the towers’ pinnacles were never executed.
After reorganization, the building successfully attracted luxury-minded tenants; in 1982 El Dorado turned co-op. Unlike other pricey New York cooperatives, El Dorado welcomes celebrities. Famous tenants and former tenants include (in no particular order) Bruce Willis, Tuesday Weld, Barney’s founder Barney Pressman, Faye Dunaway, Garrison Keillor, Michael J. Fox, U2’s Moby, Sinclair Lewis, Marilyn Monroe, Groucho Marx, and Alec Baldwin.
One celebrity the apartments could have done without was the resident of apartment 9B – you can read the gruesome details in The New York Times New York Daily News
*El Dorado is Spanish for “The Golden One,” so THE El Dorado is redundant; the official name is Americanized as The Eldorado – but the canopy on Central Park West has it El Dorado. The name is inherited from an earlier (1902) eight-story luxury apartment house on the same site, El Dorado.
Gallery: Hover over photos for captions; click to view images in lightbox
300 CPW-Eldorado 001.jpg | 5589×3726
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 002.jpg | 2480×5672
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 003.jpg | 2296×5760
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 004.jpg | 5760×3809
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 005.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 006.jpg | 3840×5760
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 007.jpg | 3799×4787
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 008.jpg | 3840×4312
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 009.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 010.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 011.jpg | 4960×3438
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 012.jpg | 3378×5464
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 013.jpg | 5178×3546
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 014.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 015.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 016.jpg | 3815×5723
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 017.jpg | 3840×5760
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 018.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 019.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 020.jpg | 3840×5760
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 021.jpg | 3840×5760
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 022.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 023.jpg | 3840×5760
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 024.jpg | 3840×5760
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 025.jpg | 5670×3780
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 026.jpg | 3840×5760
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 027.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 028.jpg | 5703×3802
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado 031.jpg | 5760×3840
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
300 CPW-Eldorado pano.jpg | 7051×3543
300 Central Park West, Eldorado, was designed by Emery Roth in collaboration with Margon & Holder. The twin-tower landmark was completed in 1931.
All images copyright © Kenneth Grant / photos taken Jan 2014-Jul 2015
1931 , 300 Central Park West , 300 CPW , apartment building , apartments , Art Deco , brick , cast stone , Central Park West , co-op , cooperative , Eldorado , Emery Roth , high-rise , historic , landmark , Manhattan , Margon & Holder , National Register of Historic Places , New York , New York City , NY , NYC , residential , twin-tower , Upper West Side , Upper West Side/Central Park West Historic District , USA , UWS
