Charles Pierrepont Henry Gilbert

Charles Pierrepont Henry Gilbert (August 29, 1861 – October 25, 1952 Gilbert was a descendant of English and New England ancestors. One of these was Sir Humphrey Gilbert (c. 1539 – September 9, 1583), to whom Queen Elizabeth I of England granted a patent for the colonization of North America. Sir Humphrey's ambitious plans ended when he was lost at sea with most of his company on their return voyage from the exploration of Newfoundland. Other members of the family, however, soon planted the name in North America.

Another noteworthy building was the 1888 Richardsonian Romanesque mansion at Eighth Avenue and Carroll Street in Park Slope, Brooklyn for Thomas Adams Jr., a chewing gum magnate. From 1893 on, Gilbert had a very large business, which grew steadily. In addition, he was a director or a stockholder in a number of large manufacturing companies outside of New York.

He saw action during the Spanish–American War of 1898. After the war he returned to New York.

By 1900 Gilbert had acquired a reputation as a specialist in designing opulent townhouses and mansions. Among his Fifth Avenue palazzi is the 1905 Neo-Renaissance mansion of Morton Freeman Plant, son of railroad tycoon Henry B. Plant. Through the 1920s he designed more than 100 New York City mansions in various styles; several of them along Fifth Avenue have now been re-purposed for institutional use. In education, client list and architectural style, Gilbert largely followed in the footsteps of Richard Morris Hunt, whose petit château on Fifth Avenue for William Kissam Vanderbilt set a model for French Late Gothic limestone châteaux to house the elite of the Gilded Age. Amongst Gilbert's clients were wealthy and influential industrialists and bankers such as Harry F. Sinclair, Joseph Raphael De Lamar, Felix M. Warburg, Otto H. Kahn, Adolph Lewisohn, Augustus G. Paine Jr. and families such as the Baches, Reids, Wertheims, Sloanes and other. He is interred at Woodlawn Cemetery in The Bronx, New York City.

Memberships Gilbert was a member of numerous professional and social organizations, amongst them the Chamber of Commerce of the State of New York, the Architectural League, the Society of Colonial Wars, the General Society of the Sons of the Revolution, the New England Society, and the Fine Arts, Metropolitan, Union League, Lawyers', Riding, Racquet, Ardsley, Colonial, Country, and Nassau Country clubs of New York. He also was a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects, and a veteran of Squadron A, the cavalry organization of the New York National Guard.

Works Gilbert's works include:

1881 – Jules S. Bache residence, 10 East 67th Street, remodeled in 1889. 1886 – Fourteen brownstowne rowhouses in the Manhattan Avenue Historic District: 120-40 Manhattan Avenue, 39–43 West 105th Street, 38–44 West 106th Street 1888–1904 – at least eight of the Montgomery Place mansions (#11, 14, 16–19, 21, 25, 36–50, 54–60), between 8th Avenue and Prospect Park, Brooklyn c. 1890 – Joseph Hanan residence, Carroll Street and 8th Avenue, Park Slope, Brooklyn; demolished in the 1930s Converse was the first president of the Bankers Trust Company; his Greenwich, Connecticut estate is now known as Conyers Farm 1901 – Henry Seligman residence, 30 West 56th Street, now Aeffe USA 1903 – 57 Stone Street, built in the Dutch Colonial Revival style for Amos F. Eno, a son of Amos R. Eno 1904 – The Knabe Building, 437 Fifth Avenue 1905 – Joseph Raphael De Lamar House, Madison Avenue and 37th Street, now the Polish Consulate General 1905 – Edward Holbrook House, 4 East 52nd Street, now the Cartier Building 1906–1908 – Felix M. Warburg House, 92nd Street and Fifth Avenue, now the Jewish Museum 1913–1914 – Charlcôte House in Flat Rock Camp, constructed for Charlotte M. Bedell Paine; demolished 1980s 1914–1916 – Weckesser Hall, Wilkes University, Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania 1915–1918 – Mrs. Seymour H. Knox House, 800 Delaware Avenue (formerly 806), Buffalo, New York, now the offices of Cellino Law 1916–1918 – Otto H. Kahn House, 91st Street and Fifth Avenue, with architect J. Armstrong Stenhouse, now the Convent of the Sacred Heart 1917 – Adolph Lewisohn residence, 9 West 57th Street, demolished 1917 – 1067 Fifth Avenue, near 87th Street, apartment design in the French Gothic style 1919–1921 – Arthur and Alice Sachs residence, 42 East 69th Street, now Jewish National Fund 1921 – Essex County National Bank, Willsboro (founded in 1923 by Augustus G. Paine Jr., today part of Champlain National Bank) 1924–1925 – Seymour H. Knox II House, Buffalo, New York 1929–1930 – Paine Memorial Library, Willsboro