Which New York City department store once featured Andy Warhol’s paintings in its windows?

With their huge footprints and elaborate window displays, New York City department stores are as much tourist destinations as they are shopping centers.

Bonwit Teller used to be one such destination. A luxury retailer on Fifth Avenue, it set itself apart by hiring up-and-coming artists to add flair to its windows. The first artist to do so was Salvador Dalí. Over the next several decades, other artists put their own stamp on the windows; in 1961, Bonwit Teller display director Gene Moore hired Andy Warhol to do so.

Warhol’s work was not being taken seriously at the time, as the more “mainstream” New York School style of painting was still popular in the art world. Nevertheless, Warhol (who had been working as a commercial illustrator), chose to hang five pop art paintings inspired by comic books and newspaper ads in the window, as the backdrop for store dummies modeling clothing. The display was meant as a commentary on the nature of consumerism. At the time, the pop art movement was just beginning, but the exposure garnered by Warhol's window display for Bonwit Teller, helped to successfully launch his career.

Under Gene Moore’s direction, Bonwit Teller gave many modern artists their starts. For more than 50 years, Bonwit Teller had an eye for the New York avant-garde art scene; but, apparently, all good things must end. In 1979 the shop was shuttered and acquired by magnate investor Donald Trump. By 1983 a tall shiny skyscraper stood in its place - the Trump Tower.