Flatiron/Nomad

October 30, 2015

PBDW’s Nomad Hotel Prepares for 20-Story Addition to Historic McKim Mead & White Building

Alex Ohebshalom’s Empire Management may finally be moving forward with plans to convert a McKim Mead & White-designed bank building at 250 Fifth Avenue and construct a 21-story hotel-tower behind. The project is the latest to join Nomad's recent hotel boom that has produced the Ace Hotel, Nomad Hotel, Flatiron Hotel, and the upcoming Virgin Hotel. While building permits filed in July have yet to be approved, the existing six-story building recently cleared out its retail tenants, and its upper office floors now appear empty. Since the site lies within the Madison Square North Historic District, the owners, under the LLC Quartz Associates, had to secure approvals from both Community Board 5 and the Landmarks Preservation Commission. With a proven track-record of steering projects in historically sensitive areas towards approval, architects Platt Byard Dovell White were commissioned. PBDW uncovered that a mid-rise loft building was once proposed for the site and this evidence allowed for LPC to more seriously consider a taller addition to the 1907, palazzo-like building designed for Second National Bank.
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Starchitect Vishaan Chakrabarti Scoops Up a $5.78M Condo at FXFowle’s 35XV

Image: Vishaan Chakrabarti image © Henry Hung Photography superimposed on a model unit image

October 29, 2015

Starchitect Vishaan Chakrabarti Scoops Up a $5.78M Condo at FXFowle’s 35XV

By Annie Doge

Vishaan Chakrabarti is closing out 2015 with a bang. After not only making a $4.995 million sale on his Flatiron loft earlier this month but also leaving his position at SHoP Architects to start his own firm, Partnership for Architecture and Urbanism (PAU), the starchitect has just closed on a $5.78 million unit a FXFowle's dramatic Flatiron tower, 35XV. According to the Post, Chakrabarti's new pad measures just slightly smaller than his last at 2,324 square feet, but hosts three spacious bedrooms, each with en suite baths, and comes outfitted with a Lutron home automation system that includes touch-pads, remote controlled shades, lighting systems and temperature control.
Check out the floorplan here

October 27, 2015

First Look at the Bow Building’s Interiors, Fifth Avenue Gem Comes Back to Life as Condos

By Ondel Hylton

Here's a first look at the interiors of Pan-Brothers Associates lovingly restored condominium development The Bow Building at 242 Fifth Avenue. Acquiring its name from the ornamental bow cast onto its facade, the structure's Queen Anne cast-iron front has been rehabilitated to its original 1885 grandeur. Once home to high-end antique furniture stores, tailors and art dealers, its sumptuously-scaled, arched windows will soon flood light into four bespoke units, each equipped with 11- to 20-foot ceilings and private outdoor spaces.
More info and all the renderings

October 26, 2015

First Peek at Alchemy Properties’ 26-Story NOMA Condominium

By Ondel Hylton

Here's our first peek at Alchemy Properties' upcoming mixed-use condominium development NOMA. Slated to rise 26 stories/316 feet from a 7,000-square-foot corner lot at 846-850 Sixth Avenue, the building will be the first ground-up condominium development in NoMad west of Fifth Avenue. With demolition just wrapping up on a single-story strip of retail stores, excavation will soon begin for a FXFowle-designed mixed-use tower that is slated to house 52 condo apartments and 13,000 square feet of retail space on its first two floors. Zoning diagrams filed at the Department of Buildings indicate the form of the tower will be composed of variously scaled and skewed interlocking volumes. Units with eastern exposures will have balconies.
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September 30, 2015

A Flatiron Loft That’s Rocking Exposed Brick Asks $3.85 Million

By Emily Nonko

All New York City loft lovers should check out this apartment for sale at 11 West 20th Street, a prewar Flatiron condo building. It's a big space with two bedrooms, a den, home office, and three full bathrooms, plus plenty of those lofty prewar details. High ceilings and big windows, of course, are a given, and then there's tons of exposed brick to go around. You'll find it in most every room, some natural and some of it whitewashed. Now on the market, this apartment is asking $3.85 million.
See inside

Distinctive Homes

September 28, 2015

Vishaan Chakrabarti, Principal at SHoP Architects, Sells Flatiron Loft for $5M

By Annie Doge

SHoP Architects is known for its cutting-edge designs, from supertall towers like 111 West 57th Street to massive schemes like the Domino Sugar Factory. So it comes as a bit of a surprise that one of the firm's principals, Vishaan Chakrabarti, chose to settle down in a rather traditional Flatiron loft. But perhaps he's looking to get in on the luxury condo trend that SHoP is such a part of, as he and his wife Maria Altaris (also an architect) have unloaded their massive pad at 12 West 17th Street for $4,995,000, according to city records released today. Chakrabarti previously served as the director of the Manhattan office for the Department of City Planning, as well as a senior executive at the Related Companies. In addition to his current role at SHoP, he is a professor at the Center for Urban Real Estate at Columbia. The architect couple bought the full-floor, three-bedroom unit in 2012 for a significantly lower price of $2,725,000 after moving from a duplex in Tribeca with their young son and daughter. Chakrabarti told the Times at the time, "When I decided to become an architect and a professor instead of a real estate developer, it required a little lifestyle shift. More work for less pay." Not deterred, however, they undertook a gut renovation, clearly referencing their design history books and outfitting the 2,500-square-foot space with modern Chesterfield sofas, a Saarinen dining table, Eames chair, and Barcelona bench.
Look around the loft here

September 17, 2015

This Nomad Loft Was Created With Curbside Finds, Elbow Grease and an Eye for Beauty

By Michelle Cohen

There was a time in NYC when there wasn't an expectation that an apartment or loft come with a full set of shiny new appliances and amenities; you could carve out a space for yourself over time, and end up with a beautiful, unique and comfortable home. That's about the time–1977, to be exact–when the owners of this cool and crafty Nomad loft, then a recent co-op conversion, bought it for $50,000 and moved in. Now this large two-bedroom 12th floor loft with a private terrace is on the rental market for $8,000 a month. The owners–she was an art historian who passed away about a year ago, he's a retired biophysicist–and their daughter had always been fond of the excitement of scavenging what others left behind–like a six-burner restaurant stove and what is now a veritable jungle of plants. The building had been used for light manufacturing, and the couple had to design the entire 1,620-square-foot space to make it a home. Since the space was completely raw, they could configure it any way they pleased. The loft was featured in a 2006 article in the Times, in which the home's late owner and main design force is described as having "a gimlet eye for the gorgeous."
Take a look around, this way...

September 15, 2015

Gorgeous Roof Garden Atop This $3M Flatiron Loft Has an Outdoor Cinema and Cinematic Views

By Michelle Cohen

As much as we love lofts, they're sometimes better in theory than reality; they're either too slick and highly customized as someone's dream palace, or they're a little too raw and lack privacy and separation of space. And their rooftops, while huge, are often gritty urban spaces. In the penthouse loft at 22 East 18th Street asking $2.995 million, you can have your cake in a custom kitchen worthy of a newly-minted luxury apartment and eat it in a verdant enchanted roof garden high above the Flatiron district. This one- (convertible to two-) bedroom co-op has authentic 1900 cast-iron loft bones, details and all, state-of-the-art interiors and mechanical systems (central air and sound and a private elevator to name just a few), plus tons of light and, perhaps best of all, a magical common roof garden with self-irrigated plantings, benches and a custom outdoor cinema–and movie-worthy views of the city.
Have a look around, this way...

Distinctive Homes

August 24, 2015

A Modern Loft Asks $2.2 Million at the Historic McIntyre Co-Op Building

By Emily Nonko

This modern, uniquely-designed loft comes from the McIntyre Building, an historic co-op built in 1892 by Ewen McIntyre at 874 Broadway in Flatiron. The current apartment design takes all the good things about a loft—the high ceilings and big windows—and amplifies them, creating a bright, airy apartment. If that's right up your alley, you also have the opportunity to combine this one-bedroom, which is asking $2.2 million, with another unit in the building for a total of $5.4 million. The result would be the ultimate four-bedroom, three-bathroom duplex loft apartment. But for now, let's focus on this one-bedroom...
Check it out

Distinctive Homes

August 19, 2015

This Flatiron Rental Offers Classic Loft Living, Modern Luxury, and Curious Built-Ins

By Michelle Cohen

Back in the 20th century, before luxury loft condos were a thing, artists, heiresses and the adventurous lived large in city lofts, and while the artists needed the square footage for living and working, others enjoyed the idea of carving out living areas in a cavernous open space with ceilings so high you almost couldn't see them, and windows almost as big. It was a world of (private) freight elevators and DIY kitchens (the look of which today's high end kitchens emulate). This Flatiron loft at 10 East 18th Street offers a hangar-esque 2,700 square feet of living space accessed by private keyed elevator; exposed brick walls are lined with oversized windows and there are plenty of custom-built luxuries that are more professionally-crafted than DIY; though there's no floor plan, it's listed as having two bedrooms and 2.5 baths. There are also more modern comforts than you'd find in an old-school loft, such as a wine cooler, central air and a Bosch washer-dryer–and there's a totally 21st century price tag of $14,000 a month.
Take a look around this huge loft

Distinctive Homes

August 13, 2015

Could This Honeycomb Tower Be Moshe Safdie’s Bancroft Building Replacement?

By Ondel Hylton

Images of a mysterious high-rise project have been posted on the website of Architecture Work Office, depicting a balcony-laden 50-story residential tower that balloons in area as it rises. The rendered skyscraper appears to align with a block-through development site near the corner of West 29th Street and Fifth Avenue that has been assembled by Ziel Feldman's HFZ Development. That site was purchased from the Collegiate Churches of New York in 2013 and was partially occupied by the striped brick and limestone Bancroft Building dating to 1896. Despite pleas from preservationists, the building was demolished earlier this year and has gone down as one of the city's most heart-wrenching architectural losses in recent years.
is this new tower in the works?

July 28, 2015

Where to Find the NYC Haunts and Houses of Famous Writers

By Jason Carpenter

New York City has always been a hub for writers. Whether they were living in luxury or getting their start as starving artists, famous writers have lived and worked all across New York, and you can still see many of these writerly abodes today. Whether you're a fan of the Beat Generation, Sci-Fi, or even Southern Gothic, you might be interested in tracking down a famous writer's home.
See where writers lived and worked here

First Look at the Interiors of Nomad’s 212 Fifth Avenue

*** Update via the development team: Interior renderings from ASJNY are only conceptual and do not represent the actual project moving forward.

July 17, 2015

First Look at the Interiors of Nomad’s 212 Fifth Avenue

By Ondel Hylton

Here's our first look at what the residences of a highly anticipated condo conversion at 212 Fifth Avenue could look like. In March we revealed a set of whimsical renderings for a conceptual design whipped up by the visualization artists ASJNY. The actual plan going forward, approved by the Landmarks Preservation Commission this past April, calls for a more sensitive touch. In addition to carving out 48 homes, the 1913 neo-gothic building's ground-level storefronts will be renovated, its parapets reconstructed, and the tower's stately limestone, terra-cotta and brick exterior will be restored, which may entail creating some additional windows.
More details ahead

June 17, 2015

$3.6M Flatiron Loft Is Flooded With Light, Unique Details

By Emily Nonko

A Flatiron loft at 141-145 West 17th Street in the Old Warren House apartment building has hit the market asking $3.625 million. Formerly a printing factory, the building now holds 12 upscale co-ops that still have features remaining from the building's factory days. This particular unit is a bright floor-through apartment with plenty of space and light. And as the Daily News reports, the current owner is Ernest Alexander Sabine, "the fashion design guru credited with reinventing the man bag."
Check it out

Distinctive Homes

June 3, 2015

This Verdant and Bright NoMad Loft Rental Is Channeling the Tropics

By Aisha Carter

If you're looking for a loft with character, you'll want to check out this unit at 107 West 25th Street in Chelsea. It has all the original elements you look for, like refinished hardwoods, and whitewashed exposed brick, while throwing in some rare extras like original tin ceilings, exposed pipes painted red, and a 16-foot skylight. And it's available for rent for the first time ever for $6,500 a month.
More pics inside

Distinctive Homes

REVEALED: Rafael Viñoly’s Slender 52-Story Condo Tower Design for Nomad

Image via New York YIMBY

June 1, 2015

REVEALED: Rafael Viñoly’s Slender 52-Story Condo Tower Design for Nomad

By Diane Pham

Is there any architect more in demand than Rafael Viñoly these days? NY YIMBY has uncovered the first renderings of the starchitect's latest residential project, a tower slated to pierce the sky from a Nomad site at 281 Fifth Avenue. Though notably smaller than 432 Park Avenue at just 705 feet, the skyscraper does share the 432's stark and very geometrical shape. It will also be one of the tallest in the neighborhood once constructed.
Find out more here

Rendering of the penthouse, which occupies the tower’s top three floors

April 17, 2015

Rupert Murdoch Lists One Madison Penthouse for $72M, Is Reportedly Buyer of $25M West Village Townhouse

By Dana Schulz

The Wall Street Journal reports today that News Corp. and 21st Century Fox chairman Rupert Murdoch has listed his penthouse at One Madison for $72 million. He bought the 6,850-square-foot triplex last February, in conjunction with a full-floor unit on the 57th floor below, for $57.25 million. He originally intended to use the smaller apartment as a guest suite, and moved into it while architect Jose Ramirez built out the penthouse. But Murdoch has now shifted gears, putting the penthouse on the market, keeping the 57th-floor unit, and buying a $25 million West Village townhouse where he plans to live full time. Interestingly, the townhouse is reportedly the former purple bed and breakfast turned single-family mansion, which hit sales records on Wednesday.
More details on Murdoch's real estate moves

April 7, 2015

Tracing the Colorful History of Madison Square Park from the 1800s

By Lauren Price

Recent reports show that NoMad has taken over the top spot for priciest neighborhood in the city in which to rent, with a one-bedroom unit going for an average of $4,270/month. For most real estate aficionados this isn't shocking, as the neighborhood has been growing into one of the city's hottest spots for the past several years, but few know of the area's fascinating past. Named for our fourth president, James Madison, the 6.2-acre Madison Square Park was first used as a potter’s field, then an army arsenal, then a military parade ground and finally as the New York House of Refuge children’s shelter, until it was destroyed by a fire in 1839. After the fire, the land between 23rd and 26th Streets from Fifth to Madison Avenues was established as a public park enclosed by a cast-iron fence in 1847. The redesign included pedestrian walkways, lush shrubbery, open lawns, fountains, benches and monuments and is actually similar to the park that exists today.
Find out how our beloved madison square park came to be

History

Extension of NoMad Historic District Has Preservationists at Odds with Building Owners

Broadway between 26th and 27th Streets, part of the current Madison Square North Historic District, via Wiki Commons

March 31, 2015

Extension of NoMad Historic District Has Preservationists at Odds with Building Owners

By Dana Schulz

Over the past few years, NoMad (north of Madison Square Park) has been the subject of countless articles looking at its rise to becoming a go-to place for culture, food, business, and residential opportunities. In fact, as we reported last June, since 2009 the neighborhood has seen price-per-square-foot averages rise by 40 percent. But not everyone looks at this neighborhood as the next frontier. Local residents and preservationists see the area as a relic of the late 19th century, when it was home to the city’s most opulent hotels and mansions and brownstones occupied by New York’s elite, as well as of the Roaring Twenties, when the community boomed as a commercial hub. For these cultural reasons and for NoMad's wealth of industrial and gilded architecture, a proposal will be heard tonight in front of the landmarks committee of Community Board No. 5 to extend the Madison Square North Historic District. NoMad property owners and developers don't agree with the proposal, citing that the area's building stock has been significantly altered over the years. As the Wall Street Journal reports, "The face-off is significant because it is centered in an area that has seen hundreds of millions of dollars of private investment, with new hotels and apartment buildings breaking ground, and new stores and restaurants opening almost weekly. In the eyes of real-estate executives, it would freeze growth in a rare section of Midtown Manhattan still ripe for development."
More details

March 26, 2015

Construction Update: ODA Architects’ 155W 18th Gets Its Skin

By Ondel Hylton

Flying under the radar, an 11-story, 30-unit condominium at 155 West 18th Street has topped off and is applying a dignified bluestone facade to its concrete structural frame. Developed by Eldad Blaustein's Izaki Group and designed by ODA Architects, 155W 18th joins a list of recent and upcoming downtown residential buildings sensitive to the rhythms and proportions of their neighbors, while still introducing fresh forms and rich materials to excite our senses and enhance our surroundings. With young design firms such as ODA, SHoP, and DDG leading the way, a cool and confident downtown vernacular has emerged, trading cookie-cutter layouts, flat glass skins, and pastiche styling for spacious light-filled floor plans and exteriors composed of sumptuous materials that provide a kind of weight and timelessness to the structures.
More details on 155 West 18th Street's progress

March 13, 2015

New Renderings for 212 Fifth Avenue Show a Whimsical Top-Floor Restaurant and Enormous Clock

By Ondel Hylton

With the debut of their newly-sharpened website, the visual-realization whizzes at AJSNY are seeking to steal some Apple Watch buzz with this stunningly whimsical rooftop addition atop the now-under-conversion 212 Fifth Avenue in Nomad. The conceptual vision, designed by the rendering team themselves, shows a bronze-clad, multi-story addition wrapped with sinuous ribbons framing an enormous south-facing clock. Below the steampunk-esque penthouse, AJSNY depicts a standard condo-conversion affair of open layouts and double-height spaces for the 1913 neo-medieval tower. The team's images also give us an idea of what the official owners–Madison Equities, Thor Equities, and Building and Land Technology–have in mind for this quintessential Manhattan address. The scheme is not official or approved, but it certainly is creative.
More details on the proposed design ahead

February 25, 2015

Is 212 Fifth Avenue the Ultimate Manhattan Address?

By Dana Schulz

That's what developers of a new condominium at 212 Fifth Avenue are hoping. The prestige of Fifth Avenue is world-famous (it also adds a 5- to 10-percent premium to the price of an apartment), and as anyone who was around back in the days of analog phone exchanges knows, 212 is synonymous with Manhattan. Reporting on the "New York-iest address," the Daily News mentions how even "Seinfeld"'s Elaine steals her dead neighbor's 212 phone number after she gets changed to a 646 area code. "The bearer of a 212 phone number looks like a longtime New Yorker. It's the ultimate luxury accessory," the paper says.
Is all the fuss justified?

Real Estate Trends

February 13, 2015

New Yorker Spotlight: Curator Sarah Forbes on the Museum of Sex (It’s Not Exactly What You Think It Is)

By Susan Cohen

If you've walked along lower Fifth Avenue, then the Museum of Sex most certainly has caught your eye; maybe you've even visited it and seen a few of the exhibits curated by Sarah Forbes. Sarah is the museum's sole curator, which means it's her job to conceive and oversee exhibitions on a myriad of topics related to sex. Her goal is the same as the museum's goal: to expand visitors' horizons and to dispel myths and misconceptions that are out there. Beyond educating the public through its oftentimes provocative exhibits, the Museum of Sex is dedicated to sharing information and artwork through its permanent collection of over 15,000 artifacts as well as its research library and media archive. With Valentine's Day approaching, we couldn't think of a better time to chat with Sarah to find out more about New York's relationship with sex, how the museum helps the city understand it differently, and why it's the perfect spot to celebrate the holiday.
Read on for our interview with Sarah

January 9, 2015

NoMad’s Commune Hotel Reaches Street Level, Will Feature a Public Roof Deck at 300 Feet

By Ondel Hylton

After lying fallow for years, the site of the city's first Commune Hotel at 11 East 31st Street is abuzz with construction activity and has risen to street level. Developed by Simon Development Group, Cube Capital, and Eagle Point Hotel, the 250-room, 32-story hotel situated between Fifth and Madison Avenues will be among a dozen new residential and hotel developments slated to transform the once-sleepy NoMad neighborhood. With Gwathmey Siegel Kaufman Architects serving as the design architects and Mancini-Duffy Architecture as the architects of record, the slender 335-foot tower will feature a 125-seat restaurant, lounge, and a rooftop bar providing sweeping skyline vistas and front-row views of the Empire State Building.
More on the hotel and construction progress ahead

January 6, 2015

Ultra-Modern NoMad Loft Returns to the Market with a $1M Price Increase

By Aisha Carter

The unusual $3.84 million loft at 50 West 29th Street is sure to be a head-turner, but not necessarily for the reason you may be thinking. Oh, we know what you’re thinking. Just look at it: a 20th century industrial loft with a modern 21st century twist. Sprawling spaces that make you want to whip out your bowling shoes. Pipes for days. But what you won't see in the architecture is the mysterious $1 million added to the price tag since it disappeared from the market last year. We’ll cast aside all judgment for a moment as we take a look at this remarkable space, because, let’s be honest, it’s a looker.
Take a look around here

Distinctive Homes

December 31, 2014

Nomad Is a Portable Herb Planter Perfect for City Living

By Dana Schulz

Apartment dwellers are famous for turning their fire escapes into extensions of the home. From serving as a relaxing spot to enjoy a morning cup of coffee to drying wet laundry, the fire escape does it all. One of its most common makeshift uses is as a garden, since many New Yorkers don't have a backyard. But growing plants and herbs out there can be a bit challenging, especially when your upstairs neighbor insists on dropping cigarette butts or when you have to climb over the couch and out the window just to get a piece of basil. That's where Nomad comes in. A clever creation of the Garden Apartment, the portable herb planter was designed with the urbanite in mind. It can hang indoors from the ceiling or on a wall and can even attach to bicycle handlebars.
More on Nomad ahead

December 19, 2014

REVEALED: NoMad Tower by FR-EE; Is It a Cowbell, Exclamation Point, or Cheese Grater?

By Ondel Hylton

Another exclamation point in a year of seemingly endless skyscraper unveilings has appeared on the city's "to-build list" with a possible rendering of a long-proposed mixed-use tower slated for the heart of NoMad. This exclamatory statement comes from the Mexico-based office of Fernando Romero EnterprisE (FR-EE). Never heard of them? Then check out their website and browse the bold work we New Yorkers too often miss out on. If the selection of FR-EE is official, Ziel Feldman’s HFZ Capital would join a growing list of New York developers bitten by the design bug. Developers like Hines, Rosen, Related, and Extell have led the way in commissioning big name, often foreign, architects to pen skyline-shifting projects aimed at the top of the market. HFZ also commissioned British-based David Chipperfield Architects to design a dignified 30-story tower along the southern edge of Bryant Park.
More details on the 50-story tower here

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