"The Park Central
In the heart of New York 7the Avenue - 55th to 56th Street
The favorite room for entertaining is the French Room, done in elaborate peach and gold and exquisite cabinet work. On the wall and ceiling are Watteau panels from the hand of Willy Pogany, bringing to mind the courtly days of the debonair dandies and lovely ladies of old France."
William Andrew Pogany (born Vilmos András Pogány; August 24, 1882 – July 30, 1955) was a prolific Hungarian illustrator of children's and other books. His contemporaries include C. Coles Phillips, Joseph Clement Coll, Edmund Dulac, Harvey Dunn, Walter Everett, Harry Rountree, Sarah Stilwell Weber, and N.C. Wyeth.[2] He is best known for his pen and ink drawings of myths and fables.[3] A large portion of Pogany's work is described as Art Nouveau.[3] Pogany's artistic style is heavily fairy-tale orientated and often feature motifs of mythical animals such as nymphs and pixies.[3] He paid great attention to botanical details.[3] He used dreamy and warm pastel scenes with watercolors, oil paintings, and especially pen and ink.[3] Painstakingly detailed and confident, Pogany's pen and ink pieces portray the true extent of his talent.
Central Park is an urban park in Manhattan, New York City. It is located between the Upper West Side and Upper East Side, roughly bounded by Fifth Avenue on the east, Central Park West (Eighth Avenue) on the west, Central Park South (59th Street) on the south, and Central Park North (110th Street) on the north. Central Park is the most visited urban park in the United States, with an estimated 37–38 million visitors annually, and one of the most filmed locations in the world. In terms of area, Central Park is the fifth largest park in New York City, covering 843 acres (341 ha).
Central Park was first approved in 1853 as a 778-acre (315 ha) park. In 1857, landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted and architect/landscape designer Calvert Vaux won a design competition to construct the park with a plan they titled the "Greensward Plan". Construction began the same year, and the park's first areas were opened to the public in late 1858. Additional land at the northern end of Central Park was purchased in 1859, and the park was completed in 1876. After a period of decline in the early 20th century, New York City parks commissioner Robert Moses started a program to clean up Central Park. Another decline in the late 20th century spurred the creation of the Central Park Conservancy in 1980, which refurbished many parts of the park during the 1980s and 1990s.
Main attractions of the park include the Ramble and Lake; several amusement attractions including Wollman Rink, Central Park Carousel, and the Central Park Zoo; Sheep Meadow; the Central Park Mall; Bethesda Terrace; the Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis Reservoir; and the Delacorte Theater that hosts Shakespeare in the Park programs in the summertime. The park also has sports facilities, including the North Meadow Recreation Center, basketball courts, baseball fields, and soccer fields.
Central Park was designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1963 and as a New York City scenic landmark in 1974. The park is owned by New York City Department of Parks and Recreation (NYC Parks), but has been managed by the Central Park Conservancy since 1998, under contract with the municipal government in a public-private partnership. The Conservancy, a non-profit organization, contributes 75 percent of Central Park's $65 million annual budget and is responsible for all basic care of the park.
New York is a state in the Northeastern United States. New York was one of the original thirteen colonies that formed the United States. With an estimated 19.54 million residents in 2018,[4] it is the fourth most populous state. In order to distinguish the state from the city with the same name, it is sometimes referred to as New York State.
The state's most populous city, New York City, makes up over 40% of the state's population. Two-thirds of the state's population lives in the New York metropolitan area, and nearly 40% lives on Long Island.[9] The state and city were both named for the 17th century Duke of York, the future King James II of England. With an estimated population of 8.62 million in 2017,[9] New York City is the most populous city in the United States and the premier gateway for legal immigration to the United States.[10][11][12] The New York metropolitan area is one of the most populous in the world.[13][14] New York City is a global city,[15] home to the United Nations Headquarters[16] and has been described as the cultural, financial, and media capital[17][18] of the world,[19][20][21] as well as the world's most economically powerful city.[22][21][23] The next four most populous cities in the state are Buffalo, Rochester, Yonkers, and Syracuse, while the state capital is Albany.
The 27th largest U.S. state in land area, New York has a diverse geography. The state is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south and Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Vermont to the east. The state has a maritime border with Rhode Island, east of Long Island, as well as an international border with the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the north and Ontario to the northwest. The southern part of the state is in the Atlantic coastal plain and includes Long Island and several smaller associated islands, as well as New York City and the lower Hudson River Valley. The large Upstate New York region comprises several ranges of the wider Appalachian Mountains, and the Adirondack Mountains in the Northeastern lobe of the state. Two major river valleys – the north-south Hudson River Valley and the east-west Mohawk River Valley – bisect these more mountainous regions. Western New York is considered part of the Great Lakes region and borders Lake Ontario, Lake Erie, and Niagara Falls. The central part of the state is dominated by the Finger Lakes, a popular vacation and tourist destination.
New York had been inhabited by tribes of Algonquian and Iroquoian-speaking Native Americans for several hundred years by the time the earliest Europeans came to New York. French colonists and Jesuit missionaries arrived southward from Montreal for trade and proselytizing. In 1609, the region was visited by Henry Hudson sailing for the Dutch East India Company. The Dutch built Fort Nassau in 1614 at the confluence of the Hudson and Mohawk rivers, where the present-day capital of Albany later developed. The Dutch soon also settled New Amsterdam and parts of the Hudson Valley, establishing the multicultural colony of New Netherland, a center of trade and immigration. England seized the colony from the Dutch in 1664. During the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), a group of colonists of the Province of New York attempted to take control of the British colony and eventually succeeded in establishing independence. In the 19th century, New York's development of access to the interior beginning with the Erie Canal, gave it incomparable advantages over other regions of the U.S. east-coast and built its political and cultural ascendancy.[24]
Many landmarks in New York are well known, including four of the world's ten most-visited tourist attractions in 2013: Times Square, Central Park, Niagara Falls, and Grand Central Terminal.[25] New York is home to the Statue of Liberty, a symbol of the United States and its ideals of freedom, democracy, and opportunity.[26] In the 21st century, New York has emerged as a global node of creativity and entrepreneurship,[27]social tolerance,[28] and environmental sustainability.[29][30] New York's higher education network comprises approximately 200 colleges and universities, including Columbia University, Cornell University, New York University, the United States Military Academy, the United States Merchant Marine Academy, University of Rochester, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and Rockefeller University, which have been ranked among the top 40 in the nation and world.