A surviving original banister from Edgar Allan Poe's 1844–1846 residence, embedded in NYU's 2004 law building after preservationists stopped demolition of the facade.
245 Sullivan Street, New York, NY 10012
Research updated June 2026
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The preserved Poe house facade on the West 3rd Street side of Furman Hall is viewable from the public sidewalk. The interior Poe Room may be accessible during NYU public hours.
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City sidewalk and accessible law school building
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Est. 1844 · Edgar Allan Poe resided here 1844–1846; wrote final Raven and Cask of Amontillado during this period · Original building demolished by NYU in 2000–2004 for Furman Hall law school expansion · Facade preserved and incorporated into Furman Hall's West 3rd Street side by preservationist agreement · Original banister retained in the new building; Poe Room established at 245 Sullivan Street
Edgar Allan Poe lived at 85 West 3rd Street — then known as Amity Street — from 1844 to 1846. During this period he completed the final version of 'The Raven,' which was published in January 1845, and wrote 'The Cask of Amontillado,' published in 1846. He was living with his wife Virginia Clemm, who was suffering from tuberculosis; the open air of the then-less-developed Village neighborhood may have been a factor in choosing the location.
The building at 85 West 3rd Street survived into the 21st century as a historic structure, though it was not protected by landmark status. In 2000, NYU announced plans to demolish it as part of the expansion of its School of Law onto the Sullivan Street block. Preservationists and Poe scholars objected. A settlement was reached: NYU would incorporate the building's facade into the new structure, positioned along the West 3rd Street side of what became Furman Hall, and retain an original banister from the demolished interior.
Furman Hall opened on January 22, 2004, named for alumnus Jay Furman. The Poe Room, located at 245 Sullivan Street, was established within the building to house a collection of Poe-related artifacts and a timeline of his life. The preserved facade elements are not a precise reconstruction but a period-consistent reinterpretation of the 1845 building's appearance, incorporating surviving original materials.
Sources
The haunting claim attached to Furman Hall is structurally unusual: it centers not on a room where someone died, or a place of tragedy, but on a surviving architectural fragment — the original banister from Poe's house, which was retained when the rest of the building was demolished and now sits in a modern law school stairwell leading to no upper floor.
Ghost tour operators covering Greenwich Village have made this incongruity the core of the story. The banister's physical presence in a building Poe never entered — attached to a staircase that goes nowhere in architectural terms — provides the kind of displacement that ghost narratives can inhabit. Operators describe Poe's spirit as drawn to the familiar object, observed climbing the banister. The New York haunted houses database and NY Ghosts have both documented accounts from law students who describe seeing a figure on the staircase matching Poe's physical description — tall, thin, dark coat.
The Untapped Cities account of Poe in Greenwich Village notes that the facade elements are a 'reinterpretation' rather than an exact preservation, complicating the authenticity of the preservation argument and, implicitly, the ghost story. Whether a fragment of the original building constitutes a genuine connection to Poe's time there is the kind of question that ghost stories tend to answer with yes.
Notable Entities
The West 3rd Street side of Furman Hall incorporates the preserved facade of the house where Poe lived from 1844 to 1846. An original banister from the demolished structure is retained inside. The Poe Room at 245 Sullivan Street houses artifacts and a timeline of Poe's life. The site is on several ghost tour routes through Greenwich Village.
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