Arguably the world’s most famous and influential urban park, Central Park was first created in 1858 to provide some respite for the city’s rapidly growing population. Set in what’s now central Manhattan, it was built away from the city’s populous areas in a mostly uninhabited area of farmland, marsh and rocky hills. A public skating rink was key to the plans and the lake was one of the first areas to open to the public for the 1858-59 skating season. Pictured here are New Yorkers skating around 1890 with the Dakota Apartments in front. Completed in 1884, it was one of the first luxury apartment buildings built in New York.
More architectural landmarks sprang up in the leafy Central Park West neighbourhood as real estate developers saw its potential. The San Remo (left) is another of the city’s historic luxury apartment towers. It opened in 1930 and dwarfs The Dakota, which can still be seen today (centre), its three-gabled facade peeking over the trees, overshadowed by surrounding buildings. While ice skating remains a perennial winter activity for New Yorkers, the views have changed dramatically in this ever-evolving city. Most recently, pencil-thin towers have started to protrude up above Manhattan’s skyline. Central Park Tower became the tallest residential-only building in the world at 1,550 feet (472m) when it was completed in 2020.
