For most of its first 30 years, the Academy met in rented spaces. In 1875 it gained its own space when it bought and fitted out a brownstone at 12 West 31st Street. Then, in 1890, the Academy moved into its own purpose-built structure at 17 West 43rd Street. Twenty years on, the Academy was looking for more space, chiefly for the Library. In 1922, the building cause got a boost when the Carnegie Corporation gave $1,000,000 (equivalent to over $15,000,000 today) for a new building. The Fellows and friends of the Academy raised another $530,000, and the corporation later added $550,000 more. The Academy purchased a lot at Park Avenue and 60th Street and then sold it in 1924 in favor of an uptown space at 103rd Street and Fifth Avenue; the deciding factor was the potential for growth. The Academy commissioned the New York architectural firm of York and Sawyer, with partner Louis Ayres, one of the most prominent architects in the country, as the lead. The cornerstone was laid on October 30, 1925, and with grand ceremonies the building opened on November 18, 1926.

Exterior view of the Academy building at 1216 Fifth Avenue.

Interior view of the lobby.

Interior view of the Library.

Interior view of Hosack Hall.

An artist's rendering of the exterior of the building..

1 of

The architects used Romanesque revival style, with its association with schools and universities evoking learning and scholarship. Exterior features made the medical context clear, featuring figures of Aesculapius and Hygeia, the serpent on the staff, and Hippocrates’ aphorism “Vita brevis, ars longa” (“life is short, but the art of medicine is long”). The medical allusions carried through to the entrance hall, decorated with images from the medical school of Salerno, as well as in the main auditorium, Hosack Hall. The Library was the heart of the building, with a grand two-story reading room overlooking Central Park and nine levels of book stacks. While its details looked to the past, the building was resolutely modern, with a film projection booth for Hosack Hall, modern kitchens and bathrooms, fully equipped meeting rooms for the Fellows’ Sections, numerous telephone booths, and a photostat service. To avoid obsolescence, staff areas and the Library stacks had built-in flexibility and could be added on to as needed. The Academy built additions in 1932–33, with the generous support of philanthropist Edward S. Harkness. The additions extended the third-floor mezzanine—creating the rare book reading room—and the fourth and fifth floors and added a new east bay with more staff spaces and what became six more levels of book stacks. The building has now served the Academy for almost 100 years.