Carpenter Apartment on Fifth Avenue

Luxurious entryway with marble geometric floor, round black table with decor, and gold accents. In the background, a dining room with a gold-patterned wall, crystal chandelier, round table, blue chairs, and a vase with purple flowers. Ornate, elegant design.

A glass door with a metal frame reflects ornate gold and brown patterns from a wall and chair. The floor features black, white, and gold geometric designs. Shadows and reflections create an intricate, elegant aesthetic.

Elegant living room with cream walls, tall columns, a sofa with rust pillows, an armchair, a glass coffee table with a black vase, a blue sofa, gold-accented décor, artwork, two mirrors, and a starburst chandelier. Sunlight filters through curtains.

A corner of a luxurious room features a black marble fireplace with gold veining, an ornate gold and black grate, part of a white tufted sofa, a gold cylindrical sculpture, a glass table, and a framed painting on a cream-colored wall.

Elegant living room with fluted white columns, gold and cream drapes, patterned armchairs, a textured ottoman, decorative lamp, and a blue vase with leafy branches on a table. Large windows let in natural light.

A hallway with cream-colored paneled walls, a circular ceiling light, and wood floors with white circular inlays leads to a bright room with a small table and a marble floor in the distance. A door with a round window is on the right.

A hallway with wooden floors leads to a cozy living area with a plush beige chair, a large colorful painting of a tree, a tall sculpture, and large windows with roman shades let in natural light. Pink flowers sit on a black counter to the left.

A modern bathroom features a black vanity with gold handles and fixtures, pink lilies in a vase, a large mirror with black trim, marble walls, and a geometric black-and-white floor. A gold magnifying mirror and a gold light fixture are mounted on the wall.

Carpenter Apartment on Fifth Avenue

Located in a J.E.R. Carpenter-designed building on Fifth Avenue from 1926, this apartment was renovated by Modernist Paul Rudolph in the 1960s, stripping its prewar details and breaking up Carpenter’s gracious floor plan into a labyrinthine suite of rooms with thin curved walls and odd hallways.

To reinvent this apartment, PPA organized the floor plan and improved circulation by opening the entry hall and tying the kitchen and back rooms to the bedroom wing. By adding entries to the dining room and study and laying the floor with a circle-and-square pattern of black Portolo and Calacatta gold marble, PPA added a sense of ceremony, making the formal spaces central to the plan. In the expansive park-facing front living room, PPA used moldings, entablatures and a pair of square fluted columns to delineate two separate yet open sitting areas, each centered on a fireplace.

PPA strove to restore the interior’s architectural character, recreating the ambiance of a Carpenter apartment with a slightly more modern and glamorous twist. The owners gravitated toward circular forms, a penchant PPA reflected in the plan and in details. Working with Venfield Interiors, PPA brought sumptuous finishes to many of the rooms. Special details included hardware PPA designed to emulate models by Emile-Jacques Ruhlmann.