Cornelius Vanderbilt II mansion 5th avenue NYC

Mansion floor plan (Cornelius Vanderbilt II), originally uploaded by Chauncy.Primm.

Here is the floor plan for the house. Wonderful. I just love Flickr!

1925c - Cornelius Vanderbilt II mansion; 5th Ave., bet. 57th & 58th

1925c - Cornelius Vanderbilt II mansion; 5th Ave., bet. 57th & 58th Sts. (demolished 1927), originally uploaded by straatis.

If you like researching about the Vanderbilt's and their houses, you need to get your hands on a copy of "The Vanderbilts and the Gilded Age" by John Foreman and Robbe Pierce Stimson. I was able to find a used (1st edition) copy on Amazon for $25 (with shipping) - finally getting my first glimpse inside this 5th Avenue mansion by Cornelius Vanderbilt II.

I've mentioned before I had a dream about this house. I've been to the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC enough times that I can easily imagine what the inside of this one would have looked like. But having not seen pics inside this house, I've often wondered why I would think this was the location from my dream? 

The pics inside are not really enough to determine if my dream actually matches the house itself. And since it was destroyed, there is no way for me to determine accuracy.

If you can find a copy, buy it immediately! You won't regret. I'm sharing a few photos of the inside. No copyright infringement intended.

 

vanderblt mansion 5th avenue new york city

I took a photograph this morning of a print I found on eBay. 

This was the home of  Cornelius Vanderbilt II, son of William Henry Vanderbilt, grandson of Cornelius "Commodore" Vanderbilt and older brother to George Washington Vanderbilt, builder and owner of the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC.

I'm fascinated by this house so I keep looking for articles and photographs of it to use as inspiration.

Vanderbilt mansion, NYC, 5th Avenue

Here is a real picture post card of New York City, 5th Avenue, between 59th and 57th Streets. This was the home of one of the Vanderbilts. The house was torn down in the mid 1920s to make way for the Bergdorf Goodman department store. What a waste! Of course, by the time the house was torn down all the buildings towered over it, since the wealthy families who lived on 5th Avenue were moving farther up town, yet still along the same road.

I had a dream about this house. I was inside, walking down a hallway, looking into various rooms. But the thing is, I had never seen any photos of the inside of this house. Now that I have, I'm a little unsettled at how close my dream was to the real thing. 

What does this have to do with writing? Well, I think I'm going to turn my dream into a story. Someone who dreams about being inside a house that was destroyed years before the person was born. There are many ways to explore the possibilities and I can't wait to start writing.