Five-Star ‘Lazar Hotel’ Coming to Midtown, Will Meld Modern With Late-1700s Baroque
West 44th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues is home to some of the city’s most elite hotels, such as the Royalton, Sofitel and Algonquin, and also  to esteemed institutions like the Harvard Club, Penn Club and New York Yacht Club. Near the stretch’s Fifth Avenue corner, a new 20-story, 96-key hotel tower is in the works at 7 West 44th Street, and it will be festooned in Baroque stylings, Juliet balconies, twisted columns, cast-iron railings, and a grand lobby staircase.
According to the building’s designers, William Green Architects with Edwards & Zuck as engineers, the project aims “to provide an exceptionally unique and exclusive program that is exemplified by the building’s unique form and appearance,” and is “designed to manifest a landmark quality that is at once entirely original while being informed by the historic neighborhood in which it resides.” Interiors will be designed by Champalimaud Design and the lavish amenities will include several restaurants and bars, a rooftop solarium/bar, grand ballroom, spa, music room, performance space, banquet area, and artist suites. The project will seek LEED Silver accreditation and utilize storm water harvesting, dual flush toilets, heat recovery, and sophisticated controls for guest room shades and lighting.
Future site of the Lazar Hotel which will combine the formerly commercial building to the left with a ground-up tower to rise from the cleared airspace to the right.
The project’s reportedly foreign developers, listed as 7 West 44th Street LLC on permits, closed on the purchase of the 75-foot- wide lot in late 2013 for $29 million, according to city records. To be known as the Lazar Hotel, the 110,000-square-foot, “member-only” inn will offer 96 guest rooms with a private club overlay. Permits approved last year reveal the proposal will gut-rehab the existing office building at 9 West 44th Street and marry it to a ground-up annex building to rise from the recently cleared adjacent lot. The newly constructed 13-20 floors will spill over onto the existing building, and will be topped by private terraces and a roof top bar.
Construction has yet to begin but is scheduled for completion at the end of 2017.
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All Renderings ©William Green Architects (WGA); Construction shots via 6sqft
