Showing posts with label i. miller shoe store. Show all posts
Showing posts with label i. miller shoe store. Show all posts

08 December 2012

Statues at Times Square's "Show Folks Shoe Shop" to Be Restored!


Last week, I posted an item about how the four statues that adorned Times Square's century-old I. Miller shoe store building had disappeared. The address is to be occupied by the Express clothing chain in the future, and there was some question as to whether the corporation would restore the two-story stone building's unique facade to its former glory—including the figures depicting Ethel Barrymore, Mary Pickford, Marilyn Miller and Rosa Ponselle in their most famous roles.

A women in the preservation community contacted me and said she would look into the matter. She wrote back with this good news:
I did find out that the building is being restored - by a VERY good firm. And that the sculptures have been taken down to be cleaned, repaired and re-installed - once restoration is completed. So...and I can't believe I am going to say this...but it appears that EXPRESS is doing the right thing. And doing the great building the honor it deserves.
Following Sandy, and the closure of Stage Deli, and the imminent closing of the Lenox Lounge, this is the best news I've heard in weeks.

21 June 2011

The Show Folks Shoe Shop in Better Times



I was browsing through an old magazine when I found this 1919 ad for the I. Miller shoe store in Times Square. The Miller building, which still exists, is familiar to all New York history buffs, owing to its one-of-a-kind statues along the south face, depicting Ethel Barrymore, Marilyn Miller, Mary Pickford and Rosa Ponselle, representing the arts of theatre, song, film and opera; and for its timeless motto, "The Show Folks Shoe Shop Dedicated to Beauty in Footwear."

It's been laboring as a garish TGI Friday's for some time, and the south facade has long been grimy and in need of a refurbishment. But this ad shows how clean and beautiful it once was: the statues white and free of bird dropping' and the windows—not cut in half by a TGIF floor plan—allowed to soar. We can also see that the wire cages on the second floor windows once held hedges.