18 East 68th St. #HOUSE

THE MAN

Henry T. Sloane was born in 1846, two years after his father, William Sloane, founded W & J Sloane, an innovational firm that built a national reputation providing luxury furnishings for the home. It quickly became the choice of the elite, functioning as an arbiter of taste for the next sixty years, and was the source for the interiors of The Breakers, the White House, Czar Nicholas II, glamorous Hollywood film sets, ocean-going yachts and even custom automobiles.

Mr. Sloane graduated from Yale in 1866 and 46 years later gifted the Sloane Physics Lab completed in 1912 and still in use today. His uncle was married to Emily Vanderbilt, the sister of Cornelius Vanderbilt. One daughter married a French Baron, the other lived at 5 East 70th Street. William Sloane Coffin, Sr. was a nephew: he lived to 91, with homes in Dark Harbor, Maine, Southampton, L.I. and New York.

Mr. Sloane’s first mansion was built in 1887 at 9 East 72nd Street, where he entertained lavishly with his wife, Jessie, a noted beauty. They divorced after a 17-year marriage in 1899, and Jessie caused a scandal by marrying Perry Belmont, son of August Belmont, five hours after the decree was issued. Mr. Sloane never married again, and he prevented his two daughters from seeing their mother until they were 21 unless she could prove she was “leading a moral life”. He then devoted his attention to his thriving business and to planning and building a masterpiece for himself, this time selecting CPH Gilbert to realize his vision.

THE ARCHITECT

The Great House era in New York lasted 50 years, from the opening of the Vanderbilt house in 1882 to the Great Depression. A great proponent of the Beaux-Arts style was CPH Gilbert, a graduate of the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, who designed such mansions as the E. C. Converse house at 3 East 78th Street in 1895, the Isaac D. Fletcher House at 2 East 79th Street, three F. W. Woolworth mansions at 2, 4 and 6 East 80 Street, a