Recently, I had the pleasure of scouting the Woolworth Building, which, as far as I’m concerned, is as close as you can come to visiting a royal palace in New York.

From its towering vaulted ceilings…

…covered in unbelievably ornate mosaics…

…with details so small, you can barely catch them from the ground…

…to its grand staircase…

…rear lit stained-glass ceiling…

…and beyond…

Entire volumes have been written about the history and construction of the building, so I won’t get into that here. But one of the reasons I love visiting the Woolworth lobby is that there’s always something new to discover.

On my last visit, for example, I noticed these tropical birds in the arches that I’d never seen before…

Barely visible from the ground, but so beautiful:

In another corner…

…this fantastic, dragon-like creature – can someone identify it?

I love the doors of the elevators…

…which almost make it feel like your stepping into a gilded leather book cover:

Even the mailboxes are dripping in ornamentation. Note the two W’s for Woolworth near the top…

But my favorite are the little salamanders crawling up vines on either side:

The Woolworth Building was designed in 1913 by Cass Gilbert…

…and if you look closely, you’ll find a caricature of him hidden near the ceiling, carrying the building itself:

But one thing I’ve always been really curious about is the marble pool said to still exist in the Woolworth basement.

When the building opened in 1913, one of its selling points was a health club complete with indoor pool and Turkish bath, open “day and night.” The pool was indeed built, and remained open until 1999, when it was finally drained (and is currently available as part of a larger retail space). It took a trip down several staircases…

But there it was: the remains of the Woolworth pool.

Alert reader David found this photograph from 1915, just two years after the building opened (check out Vintage Everyday for more vintage photos).

Here’s the same shot today:

It’s an odd shape – long, but only about wide enough to accommodate two lanes of swimming. It really is amazing to think that nearly 100 years ago, New York’s elite were first dipping their toes in the water to test it out.

I’m no expert, but the railings look like marble to me:

The pool is 7 feet at its deepest:

It’s really hard to find any information about the pool. By 1983, it was part of the Jack LaLanne health club at the location, and later still, a Bally’s. Below, a review from the 11/7/83 issue of New York magazine:

It’s unclear whether this hot tub was a later addition, or part of the original Turkish bath set-up:

To date, I don’t think the Woolworth pool has ever been featured in film or print, which is really unfortunate. I get emails every week asking for unique abandoned locales to shoot beautiful models in (apparently, beautiful models love to hang out in abandoned locations in print advertising), and I really don’t think you can find a more interesting spot than the secret pool at the Woolworth Building. I’ve also been waiting for it to appear as a plot point in any of the dozen or so New York cop shows – seriously, think of the possibilities! – but nothing yet. Definitely shoot me an email if interested – the building is very film friendly.

The Woolworth building is not open to tourists, but keep an eye out on Open House NY – they’ve given tours in the past, and hopefully they’ll have another available this year.

-SCOUT

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