The Salvation Army Headquarters is a building at 120–130 West 14th Street in the Chelsea and Greenwich Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City.

The office wing on 14th Street is sparsely decorated, although Walker used brick and cast stone, as well as stepped archways, to create a textile-like appearance.

After the Salvation Army's cofounder Catherine Booth died in 1890, members decided to build a New York City headquarters in her honor.

The Salvation Army Headquarters building is located at 120–130 West 14th Street, on the southern sidewalk between Sixth and Seventh Avenues, in the Chelsea and Greenwich Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City.

All three buildings were designed by the firm of Voorhees, Gmelin and Walker for the Salvation Army, a charitable organization, in the Art Deco style.

[8][9] According to architect and historian Robert A. M. Stern, the building's design signified a "refinement" of his tendency to use Dutch and German Expressionist elements in his structures.

[10] The office wing on the northwestern corner of the site is sparsely decorated, deriving much of its ornamentation from the treatment of the brick and stone surfaces.

[13][15] At the bottom of the opening, a set of wide stairs ascends to a bronze gate, and there is a display board on either side of the steps.

[31][32] The Salvation Army's growing U.S. operations prompted the organization to open a new headquarters on State Street in Lower Manhattan during the late 19th century.

[4] After Catherine Booth died in 1890, American Salvationists began raising money for the construction of a regional headquarters in her honor.

[4][34][35] Ballington Booth acquired an approximately 75-by-100-foot (23 by 30 m) site at 120–124 West 14th Street in March 1893 to erect a six-story building dedicated to his mother.

[34][35] In May 1894, Gilbert A. Schellenger completed plans for an eight-story headquarters building for the Salvation Army,[37][38] which was published in The War Cry magazine two months later.

[39] That November,[42] Ballington Booth received a $200,000 mortgage from the Dime Savings Bank of New York to fund the building's construction.

[43] The building itself was designed in the Romanesque Revival style and evoked a military fortification,[31][47] with a central tower flanked by turrets.

[50] In its early years, the building held events such as the Salvation Army's National Congress,[51] as well as loud concerts that prompted complaints from residents.

[60] After the Salvation Army failed to pay taxes on the 14th Street property, the city government sold the building at auction to I. Roth in June 1905.

[66] The house had previously served as a residence for members of the Roosevelt family, galleries for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and a saloon and banquet hall.

[71] The Salvation Army opened the Red Shield Club for Service Men at 128 West 14th Street in February 1919, after that structure was rebuilt.

[72] The 14th Street building was the headquarters of the Eastern Territory until 1920, when the Salvation Army created a Metropolitan Division for New York City-related activities.

[64] By then, a New York Times reporter wrote that the Salvation Army Headquarters had "meetings, drills, addresses, receptions, a night refuge, food for the poor, clothes for the needy, a nursery for children, a community store, a newspaper office (The War Cry) and an inquiry department for missing persons".

[73] The Salvation Army considered relocating, but it ultimately decided to erect a new structure on the site, since 14th Street was close to numerous modes of transit.

[64] According to historian Kathryn Holliday, the Salvation Army wished to create "a new symbol of its positive impact on the city while minimizing its costs”.

[85][86] The printing plant, tailoring division, millinery department, and other operations were transferred to a seven-story building on 321 West 13th Street, two blocks away, in March 1929.

[107] The Salvation Army announced in 1981 that it would relocate its national headquarters, as well as the publications and information services at 132–136 West 14th Street, to Verona, New Jersey.

[108][109] The move, which involved relocating about 50 employees, allowed the organization to reduce costs and combine all of the national headquarters' operations into a single building.

[118] During the 1990s, the Salvation Army Headquarters building continued to host events such as League of Mercy visitation services[119] and Thanksgiving dinners.

[120] The Salvation Army's Greater New York Division continued to use the building as a local headquarters, and it provided temporary housing and a social services center at the structure.

[45][50] Diane Winston, the author of a book on the Salvation Army's history, described the building as looking like "a mighty fortress, an apt materialization of God's kingdom".

[8] After the headquarters was rebuilt in 1930, War Cry magazine wrote that the building was "architecturally beautiful... with simplicity and harmony of proportions, in a style that was called 'nontraditional'".

[125] A critic for The New Yorker wrote of the auditorium and office building: "This combination of ordinarily unrelated elements is finely and frankly expressed on the principal elevation on Fourteenth Street.