The owner of the Windermere, a historic building in Hell's Kitchen that has long been vacant, put residents at risk by failing to repair the building's crumbling facade and remove an abandoned sidewalk shed, according to a lawsuit filed by the city Monday.
“Once known for its landmark architecture, Windermere now has abandoned sidewalk sheds and rotting plywood fencing obscuring the entire street-facing perimeter,” court documents state.
When the Windermere was built in 1881, it was the second-largest apartment complex in Manhattan. A century later, in the 1980s, the building's managers went to prison for harassing tenants.
The building was designated a separate landmark in 2005 and is the oldest remaining large apartment building in the area, with famous residents including actor Steve McQueen.
All 76 units at Windermere, located at the corner of West 57th Street and 9th Avenue, have been vacant since 2009. Current owner Mark Torres then purchased the landmarked building for $13 million. Since then, the building has accumulated hundreds of violations, 149 of which remain unresolved, according to New York City Department of Buildings (DOB) records.
Torres announced plans in 2021 to renovate the building into a 174-room hotel with shopping and a rooftop restaurant. No work appears to have progressed since then, despite multiple work permit applications being filed in 2023 and 2024, according to DOB records.
According to court documents, the building has become a “rodent and trash magnet” in recent years, with “chipped and falling bricks, a crumbling fence” and “sidewalk sheds with exposed bolts and sharp edges, missing rungs and rotten wood.” There have also been reports of debris on the facade of the building, according to the DOB release.
The city's lawsuit calls for fines of $1,000 per day until the outstanding violations under the Pollution Prevention Act are corrected.
“Property owners need to know that we will no longer tolerate them putting off repairs to important buildings and allowing sheds to sit on sidewalks for years, diminishing the livability of our city,” DOB Chairman Jimmy Oddo said in a statement.
The lawsuit is part of a citywide initiative called “Get Sheds Down,” aimed at quickly removing sidewalk construction sheds that are eyesores on city streets.
