These horizontal groupings were separated by cornices, but there was no horizontal separation between the second/third and fourth/fifth floors, leading some observers to erroneously describe the Equitable Life Building as five stories. Rather, the double-story sections contained windows measuring . The columns of windows were separated by vertical piers with paired columns. The Equitable offices, on the second and third stories, featured the world's "most complete and imposing business hall", with a domed space measuring and supported by twelve marble-clad Corinthian columns. Also within the Equitable Life Building were two raised skylights at the top of the ceiling. On the second floor was a marble counter that enclosed a workspace for 150 clerks, while the offices of 40 officers and agents ran along the periphery of the workroom. A gallery enclosed three sides of the third floor, accessed from a spiral staircase from the office of Henry Baldwin Hyde, founder of the Equitable Life Assurance Society, located in a corner of the second floor. Since Equitable occupied the second and third floors, which were seen as relatively unappealing, it was able to rent out the more desirable quarters in the basements, ground floor, and upper floors. The ground floor and the raised upper basement had banking rooms. Three of the banking rooms had marble floors, as did the entrance hall. When the building was renovated in the late 1880s, the lobby was expanded to stretch the entire block from Broadway to Nassau Street. The enlarged lobby was composed of a , arcade lined with convenience shops, post office boxes, a restaurant, and a barber. The arcade also included a barrel-vaulted ceiling with skylights, as well as a mosaic from the Herter Brothers; one critic described the arcade as a "marvel of the architect's and builder's art", in that respect superseding the nearby 280 Broadway, a grand Italianate department-store building nearby. Also in the lobby was the Cafe Savarin, a French-cuisine eatery on the Pine Street side of the building. A cross-passage stretched from Cedar to Pine Streets. The fourth through sixth floors had 50 offices, which were occupied almost exclusively by lawyers. There was also a law library with nearly 40,000 volumes, as well as a separate insurance library with 8,000 volumes. Prior to the late 1880s, the seventh floor contained suites for the building's janitorial staff; after the renovation, the seventh and eighth floors were furnished with offices, similarly to the fourth through sixth floors.