William Bunker Tubby (21 August 1858 – 1944) was an American

architect An architect is a person who plans, designs and oversees the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to provide services in connection with the design of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the buildings that h ...

who was particularly notable for his work in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. Tubby was born in

Des Moines, Iowa Des Moines () is the capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is also the county seat of Polk County. A small part of the city extends into Warren County. It was incorporated on September 22, 1851, as Fort Des Moines, ...

, and graduated from Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute in 1875.Christopher Gray
"On Speed-Dial Before Speed-Dial"
''New York Times'', March 28, 2013. He worked in the architectural offices of Ebenezer L. Roberts until beginning his own firm in 1883. Continuing this practice until his retirement in 1942, Tubby became a major New York architect. He created important buildings in a variety of styles, and was especially known for his Romanesque and Dutch Revival-style designs. The house that Tubby designed for

Charles Millard Pratt Charles Millard Pratt (November 2, 1855 – November 27, 1935) was an American oil industrialist, educator, and philanthropist. As the eldest son of industrialist Charles Pratt, in 1875 he began working at Charles Pratt and Company, soon beco ...

at 241 Clinton Avenue (1893, located in Brooklyn's Clinton Hill Historic District) is one of the city's finest examples of

Romanesque Revival architecture Romanesque Revival (or Neo-Romanesque) is a style of building employed beginning in the mid-19th century inspired by the 11th- and 12th-century Romanesque architecture. Unlike the historic Romanesque style, Romanesque Revival buildings tended to ...

. His creativity and expertise can also be seen in several other

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

homes: the neo-Jacobean Brooklyn Society for Ethical Culture Meeting House, the Romanesque Revival style home at 234 Lincoln Place, the Queen Anne style row at 864-872 Carroll Street, the residences of Brooklyn mayors at 405 Clinton Avenue, and the Dutch Revival house at 43 Willow Street, which Tubby himself occupied. His institutional designs include

Pratt Institute Pratt Institute is a private university with its main campus in Brooklyn, New York (state), New York. It has a satellite campus in Manhattan and an extension campus in Utica, New York at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute. The school was ...

's Student Union from 1887, the Romanesque Revival style South Hall for Pratt Institute in 1892 (designated New York City Landmark), the

Renaissance Revival style Renaissance Revival architecture (sometimes referred to as "Neo-Renaissance") is a group of 19th century architectural revival styles which were neither Greek Revival nor Gothic Revival but which instead drew inspiration from a wide range ...

library building for the Pratt Institute (1896, a designated New York City Landmark), the Romanesque Revival style 83rd Police Precinct House in Brooklyn (1894–95), a designated New York Landmark) and the Flemish Revival style Wallabout Market (demolished) which was once the second-largest market in the world. As a member of the Architects' Advisory Commission for the Brooklyn Carnegie Libraries, Tubby designed five library buildings. Outside of New York City, Tubby created designs for banks, churches, libraries, hospitals and large estates throughout the

Northeast The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each se ...

, including Waveny House in New Canaan, Connecticut, and

Dunnellen Hall Dunnellen Hall is a private mansion located at 521 Round Hill Road in Greenwich, Connecticut, USA. It was sold by the estate of Leona Helmsley for $35 million down from the original asking price of $125 million when it was first put up on the mar ...

Greenwich, Connecticut Greenwich (, ) is a New England town, town in southwestern Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. At the 2020 United States Census, 2020 census, the town had a total population of 63,518. The largest town on Connecticut's Gold Coast (Conne ...

. The Roslyn National Bank and Trust Company Building at Roslyn, New York, was built in 1931. Tubby lived in Brooklyn Heights at 43 Willow Street before retiring to Greenwich in his later life. A member of the Brooklyn Guild Association, he taught architecture at the Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute.

List of works

The following table presents an incomplete list of buildings designed by William Tubby, focusing on those that are extant or for which there is adequate documentation of their style. Note that most addresses link to Google Street View images of the buildings.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tubby, William 1944 deaths Artists from Des Moines, Iowa People from Brooklyn Heights People from Greenwich, Connecticut 1858 births Architects from New York City Architects from Iowa Architects from Connecticut Polytechnic Institute of New York University alumni