ASTORIA, Queens — In Queens, you’ll find a factory that makes some of the most elite pianos around. It’s a factory full of history and one big secret vault.
After 150 years of elite piano making, Steinway and Sons is riddled with history, literally shaping the Astoria, Queens neighborhood over the past 100 years. It’s a factory that our tour guide Anthony Gilroy said is still proudly union strong.
It takes about 11 months to painstakingly craft works of art — pianos played by musical greats like Cole Porter and Harry Connick Jr.
What you don’t notice right away, way under the bustling factory floors and through a rather nondescript hallway, sits a dimly-lit vault door .
The only way in? A two-scan fingerprint.
Inside the vault, you’ll find special pianos that Gilroy said the company calls the special collection of limited edition pianos.
The pianos are one of a kind, some cost more than $2 million.
There was a four-year process of creating all of this painting and the elaborate legs
One $200,000 dollar piano is equipped with player technology to play virtually any song you want without anyone sitting there.
Steinway and Sons offers tours of the factor, where you can learn the history of how that area was build literally by a piano factory.
