Bowen & McNamee's Silk Warehouse, Broadway, New York
Not on view
This print shows one of the first "marble palace" stores in New York. Located at 112-114 Broadway, it opened ca. 1849 to house the silk and drygoods merchants Bowen & McNamee. Inspired by Venetian palaces, the British-born architect Joseph C. Wells created a lavish exterior whose large window openings relied on iron supports. Many other New York merchants followed suit and created similarly palatial exteriors for their stores. During the Civil War, as sales of luxury goods declined and orders from southern clients disappeared, Bowen, Holmes & Co., as the company was then known, unfortunately went bankrupt.
One of the co-founders, Henry Chandler Bowen (1813-1896), was a leading abolitionist and member of Plymouth Church in Brooklyn. He also helped to establish The Independent, a congregationalist newspaper, edited by the renowned preacher Henry Ward Beecher, that became an important advocate for abolition and women's suffrage.
