Look Up At A Gilded Rotunda In Lower Manhattan
An elliptical rotunda with WPA murals and a domed skylight crowns Cass Gilbert's 1907 landmark at the foot of Broadway.
✨ Under the dome
Cass Gilbert finished this Custom House in 1907, and the granite pile at Bowling Green wears sculpture the way most buildings wear paint. Daniel Chester French carved the four seated figures along the steps outside. Step through the doors and the reason to visit reveals itself overhead. A vast elliptical rotunda spreads above the old collectors' hall, ringed by Reginald Marsh murals of ships steaming into New York harbor. The National Museum of the American Indian now fills the ground floor, and admission runs free. Weekday mornings leave the marble halls nearly empty.
