Herbert N. Straus House — 9 East 71st Street, major 1989–90 residential conversion
One of Joseph's final jobs sits on a remarkable Upper East Side palimpsest: an 1892 Carrère & Hastings townhouse was demolished for an enormous Horace Trumbauer mansion that was never fully completed, later became a school, and was being converted back to a residence when Joseph worked there in 1990.
Looking north from Frick terrace at 9 East 71st Street on a cloudy day. Photographed in 2019; a current view, not a construction-period photograph.
Current view · 2019 · Photo: Jim.henderson · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source
Why this project matters
- Project identity
- Verified
- Kelly connection
- Family source
- Masonry scope
- Probable
Rita’s list
Transcription: 9 East 71st Street Residence — 1990
Recorded by Rita Bartscherer · Bartscherer family record
KM-200
2 of two
“9 East 71st Street Residence — 1990”
LPC records a Carrère & Hastings Richard Hoe House at 9 East 71st Street in 1892, later demolished; Horace Trumbauer began the replacement Straus house in 1930, but the ambitious mansion was never fully completed.
This is now one of the archive's clearest site-history stories: 1892 mansion → demolition → never-completed 1930s mansion → school → Joseph-era residential reconstruction → later notorious ownership and another renovation.
What Kelly did here
Family source
Probable
Likely: selective masonry alteration/restoration: likely brick or stone repair/rebuilding, repointing, opening/infill work, plus new CMU/block backing or partitions where the renovation required them.
This scope is recorded as probable, not documented. It is a disciplined reading of the building and the trade practice of the period, not a contract-level record of Kelly’s work.
The construction team
- 01Architect
Horace Trumbauer (original exterior); Thierry Despont (1989–90s remodeling)
- 02GC / construction manager
Lehrer McGovern Bovis / Miller and Raved joint project-management effort
What happened to it
Still standing / private residence; repeatedly renovated
The house remains a private residence following another major renovation in the 2020s.
Sources
3 citedOpen →
- 01s-media.nyc.gov
1051
- 02linkedin.com
charles anderson 21380233
- 03commons.wikimedia.org
File:9E71 from Frick 01 jeh.jpg
- Jim.henderson · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons · 2019-08-23
Looking north from Frick terrace at 9 East 71st Street on a cloudy day. Photographed in 2019; a current view, not a construction-period photograph.
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