The Gilsey House is an unexpected building. Its European elegance stands out in stark contrast to the industrial brick structures surrounding it today. It was designed in French Second Empire Style by Stephen Decatur Hatch and built between 1869 and 1871. Peter Gilsey, the Danish-American businessman after whom it is named, was its first owner. The building, with its typically Parisian three-story mansard roof, is one of very few cast iron edifices in the neighborhood - the material was used mainly for buildings in Soho.
Gilsey set up a luxury hotel, whose rooms were decorated with tapestries, bronze chandeliers, marble fireplaces and walnut finishing. It was also the first hotel in New York to provide telephone services for its guests. The hotel was very popular because it stood right in the middle of the "Tenderloin" area, the zone that in the end of the 19th - beginning of the 20th centuries was the entertainment core of the city - bubbling with theaters, brothels and casinos. Notable guests at the Gilsey were Mark Twain and Oscar Wilde.
The hotel closed in 1911 due to legal disputes between the owner and the operator and throughout most of the 20th century it stood uninhabited. In 1978 it was put on the National Register of Historic Places and a year later designated as a New York City Landmark. It was finally bought in 1980 by a developing company, which transformed it into an apartment complex.