By Carter B. Horsley

This handsome, dark brown-brick, apartment tower was erected in 1974 and converted to a cooperative in 1979.

The 25-story tower has only 40 apartments, most with balconies with attractive metal railings.

This doorman building is setback in its own landscaping plaza, a rarity on Madison Avenue. While many critics have attacked the plazas in many of the city's residential towers for being either not attractive or of little public benefit, this one is pleasantly landscaped and is not bad because Madison Avenue has fairly narrow sidewalks. Furthermore, much to this building's credit, its planters are not spiked!

Many apartments on upper floors have spectacular views to west, south and east. In 1987, the view to the north were filled with the handsome new tower across the sidestreet at 35 East 80th Street. The building is located on a very attractive, quiet street and is just to the west of a synagogue.

It is convenient to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Whitney Museum of American Art. There are many fine boutiques, art galleries and restaurants in the vicinity and P.S. 6, one of the city's finest public schools, is one block north. There is good cross-town bus service on 79th Street, although the nearest subway station is several blocks away. It is two doors up the avenue from a small building that for several decades until 2000 housed the Madison Pub, one of the Upper East Side's nicest small, paneled bars and restaurants.

When this building, which has no garage, opened it was something of a high-rise pioneer on upper Madison Avenue and despite its very excellent location it had some trouble filling up.