From the archives: 15 CPW borrows a name from the old guard

15 Central Park West
15 Central Park West

A rose by any other name might smell as sweet, but what if it had a number? The prestigious buildings on Central Park West are traditionally known by their names and not by their addresses — who calls the San Remo “145 Central Park West,” or the Beresford “211 Central Park West”? Using addresses and only addresses is a haute Upper East Side convention — just think of “740 Park” (dubbed “the world’s richest apartment building” in an eponymous book by Michael Gross) or the Edgar Bronfman, Jr.-housing “1040 Fifth.”

Sign Up for the undefined Newsletter

“These places are exclusive, and being known by just an address makes the building harder to identify,” says Kathryn Steinberg, an Edward Lee Cave real estate agent who caters to a posh clientele. Going a step further, it’s an East Side convention to refer to buildings as quietly as possible. “People who lived at 856 Fifth Avenue would say they lived at 2 East 67th Street,” Steinberg notes. Read the full story from the November 2007 issue here.