Search Results for: architecture firm

December 7, 2015

Could This Otherworldly 102-Story Tower Covered in Ornaments Be Coming to 57th Street?

Jaded by glass boxes and architectural imitations of styles gone by? Well this fascinating design by Mark Foster Gage Architects is sure to turn your architectural world upside down. Here's our first look at their 102-story residential supertower seemingly flown in from some advanced airborne civilization in a galaxy far, far away. While details are scarce, this eagle lands in the heart of Midtown's Billionaires' Row along West 57th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. The whimsical design is a habitable sculpture of sorts, adorned from top to bottom in ornaments ranging from gears and propellers to an abstracted pair of birds diving in for a landing on two wing-supported balconies. The tower is topped by a temple-like observational platform which is then crowned by a golden wreath-like structure fit for any victorious Roman general.
more eye-popping visuals this way
December 7, 2015

Skyline Wars: One Vanderbilt and East Midtown Upzoning Are Raising the Roof…Height!

Carter Uncut brings New York City’s breaking development news under the critical eye of resident architecture critic Carter B. Horsley. This week Carter brings us the second installment of nine-part series, "Skyline Wars," which examines the explosive and unprecedented supertall phenomenon that is transforming the city's silhouette. In this post Carter zooms in on Midtown East and the design of One Vanderbilt, the controversial tower that is being pinned as the catalyst for change in an area that has fallen behind in recent decades. Despite some objections from community boards and local politicians, New York City is moving ahead with the rezoning of East Midtown between Fifth and Third avenues, and 39th and 59th Streets; and earlier this year, the de Blasio administration enacted an important part of the plan, a rezoning of the Vanderbilt Avenue corridor just to the west of Grand Central Terminal. The Vanderbilt Avenue rezoning included approval of a 1,501-foot-high tower at 1 Vanderbilt Avenue on the block bounded by Madison Avenue, 42nd and 43rd Streets. The tapered, glass-clad tower, topped by a spire, is being designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox for SL Green. Mayors Bloomberg and de Blasio have championed the 1 Vanderbilt proposal despite serious concerns voiced by numerous civic organizations over the rezoning scheme that some see as “spot zoning” and the fact that the city has still not finalized nor published its complete rezoning package. Using air-rights transfers from the Grand Central Terminal area and zoning bonuses for providing $210 million for infrastructure improvements in the area, the tower will significantly alter the midtown skyline, rising several hundred feet above the nearby Chrysler Building and the huge and bulky but lower MetLife Tower straddling Park Avenue just north of Grand Central Terminal. Its 63 stories are several less than the Chrysler Building and just a few more than the MetLife Tower, which might be interpreted by some observers as indicated that it was in “context” with such prominent neighbors, but they are wrong.
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December 3, 2015

Flatiron’s 21W20 Finally Unshrouded – Take a Virtual Walk Through the Penthouses

Two penthouse units (yes, two) remain at Gale International's boutique condominium development 21W20. The 15-story mid-rise is Gale's first foray into the Manhattan market and has already placed 11 of the building's 13 full-floor homes into contract at an average price of $2,528 per square foot. Slated for occupancy by year's end, the project's construction netting has finally come down and the finishing touches are now being applied to the lobby. The 35,000-square-foot building is seamlessly nestled into the heart of downtown's Flatiron neighborhood within its timeless Ladies' Mile Historic District and presents a contextual exterior of blackened stainless steel, brick, and glass crafted by New York-based architects Beyer Blinder Belle. From street level, the building climbs unassumingly from a 25-foot-wide footprint. However, its upper four stories cleverly spill over onto the adjacent garage building, ultimately creating four breathtaking, 100-foot-wide penthouses.
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November 20, 2015

Construction Update: 100 Barrow Street Rises Above Street Level From St. Luke’s Churchyard

With the foundation finally laid, Toll Brothers' 100 Barrow Street has made its way above ground and will bring 35 brand new apartments to the West Village. The tower is being built on the site of a pre-existing parking lot on the full-block grounds of the Church of St. Luke in the Fields. While no demolition of existing structures or reduction of green space was necessary, the site does lie at the western edge of the Greenwich Village Historic District and across from the Archives Building, which is an individual landmark. Proceeds from the development will be used to fund the church's own new buildings, which include an expansion of its existing private school and the construction of a new mission where L.G.B.T.Q. homeless youth and under-served individuals can receive meals and shelter. The latter will also serve as a 24/7 drop-in center where people will be able to get a change of clothes and take showers.
More details and renderings this way
November 18, 2015

New York Buildings Photoshopped Into the Paris Cityscape Create a Dramatically Different Skyline

What makes Paris so enchanting is its wonderful architecture, and while many of New York's oldest buildings take inspiration from the City of Light, placing them in a Parisian context isn't quite as seamless an act as one would think. In Paris, where low-slung architecture is favored over the supertall (buildings are rarely more than five or six stories tall, and until 2010 the height limit on all new buildings was 121 feet), a new project called "Haussmanhattan" (Haussman + Manhattan) reimagines what the landscape would have looked like if the European city had joined the great skyscraper race of the early 20th century.
Check out all the eye-popping mashups here
November 16, 2015

New Renderings of SuperPier: Google’s New NYC Digs + Bourdain Food Market To Arrive in 2018

Last month at the Municipal Arts Society's (MAS) 2015 Summit for NYC, Seth Pinsky, executive vice president at RXR Realty, shared a presentation regarding the development of the long-planned rehabilitation and conversion of Pier 57 aka "SuperPier." In addition to some new looks at the project, he revealed that the developers have largely secured financing and are finalizing talks with the Hudson River Park Trust. RXR are co-developing the project with Young Woo & Associates, and Handel Architects and !Melk Landscape Architecture and Urban Design are the commissioned designers. According to Pinsky, the 450,000-square-foot development will invest $350 million of private capital to redevelop the structure, and in return create hundreds of jobs, generate millions of dollars of revenue for the Hudson River Park Trust, and create a new destination for New Yorkers and visitors alike. The former NYCEDC head confirmed that the project will include 250,000 square feet of office space for a major technology company [Google], a 170,000-square-foot food and retail market [Anthony Bourdain], and an elevated park with an outdoor movie and performance amphitheater on the roof to be used for screenings for the Tribeca Film Festival. He also noted construction will begin during the first half of next year, with completion aimed for early 2018.
Lots more renderings and details ahead
November 11, 2015

432 Park in Numbers: New Renderings and Superlatives Will Blow You Away

Now that Macklowe Properties'/CIM Group's 432 Park Avenue is nearing completion, with occupancy slated to begin in mid-2016 and 70 percent of units reportedly in contract, the development's marketing and branding agency DBOX has released a bevy of never-before-seen images of our skyline's newest icon. Being the tower of superlatives it is, it comes as no surprise that it boasts a marketing campaign to match. Employing sky-cams, drone photography, a million-dollar film, and breath-taking renderings and photography, 432 Park has perhaps the most elaborate promotional campaign ever conceived for a Manhattan condominium. With dozens of spectacular images to choose from, we hand picked a few to recap the development of this monumental supertower. We've also put together a timeline in numbers–from its record breaking height to its 1,200-pound marble sinks–to illustrate the extraordinary undertaking  that has paved the way for the tower to become the most successful and desirable condominium ever erected in the city (sorry One57).
See it all right here
November 5, 2015

Renderings Revealed for Jeanne Gang’s $325M Museum of Natural History Expansion

One of the many things that makes the American Museum of Natural History so fascinating is its combination of architecture–very different styles from varying time periods that together make up 25 separate structures. The original Victorian Gothic building was erected in 1877, followed and eclipsed quickly by the southern neo-Romanesque stretch. Then, in 1936, the grand Beaux-Arts entrance was added, and in 2000 the famous glass box known as the Rose Center for Earth and Space was built. Now, the museum is growing yet again, reports the Times, this time with a $325 million expansion courtesy of Studio Gang. In addition to its hefty price tag and undulating form, the addition is significant for the fact that it will be the first female-led project associated with the museum structure, as the firm is headed up by starchitect Jeanne Gang. The Times calls the concept for the new Richard Gilder Center for Science, Education and Innovation "both cautious and audacious," noting that it "consumes less coveted park space than expected, while introducing a contemporary aesthetic that evokes Frank Gehry’s museum in Bilbao, Spain, in its undulating exterior and Turkey’s underground city of Cappadocia in its cavelike interior." The new 218,00-square-foot Center will help solve circulation issues (it will create more than 30 access points across ten buildings) and will be an integrated space for museum activities and research.
More renderings and details ahead
November 4, 2015

Where I Work: Tour KUSHNER Studios’ smart and quirky Chinatown office

6sqft’s series “Where I Work” takes us into the studios, offices, and off-beat workspaces of New Yorkers across the city. In this installment, we take a tour of architect Adam Kushner's quirky and intelligent Chinatown office space. Want to see your business featured here? Get in touch! You might remember hearing from Adam Kushner a little over a year ago when 6sqft interviewed him about building the world's first 3D-printed estate. And while this is certainly a huge project for the architect, it's only one of many that he and his three firms are working on. In addition to architecture/design practice KUSHNER Studios, which he founded in 1994, Adam heads up construction practice In House Group Inc. and 3D-printing company D-Shape Enterprises New York. What these practices have in common, other than their intellectual creativity, is that they're housed in a quirky-yet-functional Chinatown office. Adam recently took us on a tour of his office, giving us the story behind the studio's unconventional models, his vintage scooter collection, and the giant plane jutting out of the wall.
Look around the creative space
October 29, 2015

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

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

How NYC Could Be Better, Architects Vishaan Chakrabarti and Gregg Pasquarelli Sound Off

SHoP architect Gregg Pasquarelli and Vishaan Chakrabarti of Partnership for Architecture and Urbanism (and formerly of SHoP) talk about all of the infrastructural and architectural improvements NYC needs. The pair cite solutions spurring change in other cities around the world as examples of what we should be doing. [Curbed via Wired] The NYC Marathon generates millions of dollars for the city […]

October 27, 2015

East Village Micro-Loft Is Jam-Packed With Storage to Maximize Functionality and Efficiency

Living in a small New York City apartment is hard enough, but also using that same space for work comes with an additional layer of challenges. The owner of this 500-square-foot East Village studio had been pushing the limits of what his space could accommodate since purchasing the apartment back in 1999 before the real estate boom. With his growing collection of office supplies, gadgets, toys and art pieces, the apartment was in serious need of some organization. Thankfully with meticulous planning from the design team at Jordan Parnass Digital Architecture, the disorganized home was transformed into a highly organized and efficient living space with no clutter in sight.
Check out this amazing apartment
October 23, 2015

DDG’s Bluestone Beauty at 12 Warren Street Finally Shows Some Skin

Fully-integrated design and build firm DDG has raised the curtain on their highly anticipated condo development 12 Warren Street. Designed by their in-house architect Peter Guthrie, its facade of roughly-hewn Pennsylvania bluestone is meant to evoke the natural uneven stacking of the material. In what must have taken quite the effort to detail, variously dimensioned slabs, ranging from standard-sized bricks to large lintel blocks, protrude from the exterior at varying depths. While more commonly seen underfoot as sidewalk pavement, here the brittle stone's soothing tone softens the building's ogreish form, whose still-shrouded cliff-like top will incorporate a wild display of projecting volumes and terraces. As simply stated by architecture critic Carter Horsely, "DDG continues its elegant campaign to make New Yorkers lust after bluestone rather than brownstone."
Find out more details about the development
October 20, 2015

Clever Room Divider by Jordan Parnass Triples as Queen-Sized Bed and Storage Unit

Living efficiently in a studio apartment definitely requires careful planning, and one of the largest challenges is separating the bedroom from the living area. This custom-fabricated millwork insertion designed by Jordan Parnass Digital Architecture for a Battery Park studio, solves that problem, and a few others as well. In addition to providing the studio with a bedroom divider, the piece also holds additional storage and display shelving.
see more here
October 20, 2015

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October 16, 2015

6sqft’s Must-See Recommendations for This Weekend’s Open House New York

This year's Open House New York takes place this weekend on October 17th and 18th. A full roster of sites was revealed just over a week ago, and there is certainly plenty to see. But how will you prioritize? To help make planning your itinerary a bit easier, 6sqft has put together a list of recommendations for not-to-be-missed sites, from Google's headquarters to a food factory tour at Industry City to the 1920s gilded Loew's Kings Theatre.
See our picks here
October 9, 2015

REVEALED: Chelsea Atelier’s Mixed-Use High Line Development With Viewing Decks

Another forward-looking project may be coming to the banks of the High Line, this time for a T-shaped lot near the corner of Tenth Avenue and West 17th Street. While still in its conceptual stage, the design of 455 West 17th Street is being handled by architecture and project management firm Chelsea Atelier. The two-wing project consists of a four-story Tenth Avenue wing, to contain a small hotel or offices, and a larger 11-story wing that would house residential condominiums. Amir Shouri, senior designer at Chelsea Atelier, says the design seeks to create viewing decks to capture glimpses of the High Line and the Hudson River. The blurred boundaries between inside and out will ceaselessly showcase the "live urban activity of the High Line during the day and motivate inhabitants to go out an enjoy the area's many amenities."
More details this way
October 6, 2015

$1.6M Fort Greene Floor-Through Designed by The Brooklyn Home Company Is Quite Photogenic

Though they're charming and often in great neighborhoods, condos created from historic townhouses often disappoint. Railroad-style layouts get circumvented by oddly-configured hallways (left resembling a linear "ant farm" accessed by tunnels), kitchens are across the apartment from living rooms, bedrooms get subdivided into virtual closets, and so on. This lovely two-bedroom parlor-floor home at 122 Fort Greene Place in prime Fort Greene escapes most of those fates, and interiors by popular brownstone Brooklyn design firm The Brooklyn Home Company elevate it even further into the charm circle. The $1.6 million ask may seem high, but a sizable 1,384 square feet, tons of restored original details within a superb renovation, stellar location, and designer showcase status (it was featured in the coffee-table-favorite "Design Brooklyn," and a slew of interiors mags) rack up plenty of selling points.
Check out more of the interior this way...
September 29, 2015

LAST CHANCE: Win Two V.I.P. Passes to the New York Media Festival Tech Crawl (Worth $2,200!)

The New York Media Festival is back again and better than ever, ready to offer everyday folks an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at NYC's top tech firms. The three-day event, held October 6–9th, will bring together more than 1,000 leaders in digital media, games, music, television, and more. Our partners at CityRealty are on the amazing list of participants, and as part of the Tech Crawl event—which will also take ticket-holders into the workspaces of iHeart Radio, Conde Nast Entertainment, DOTS and many, many others—they're hosting "Boozy History of New York City," featuring drinks from local breweries and distilleries accompanied by facts, figures and history on the neighborhoods from which they hail—all to make for an educational and enlightening evening through the lens of real estate tech, architecture, and, well, booze. We've teamed up with CityRealty and New York Media Festival to give one lucky 6sqft reader two V.I.P. all-access passes to the festival (WORTH $2,200), which includes all the fun going down at CityRealty on Wednesday, October 7th. To enter, all you need to do is: 1. Follow CityRealty on Twitter Follow @cityrealtyny // 2. Tweet this message "I want to throw one back with @cityrealtyny and learn about NYC brewery history!" Tweet And that's it—you're entered to win an all-access pass to the New York Media Festival! The deadline to enter is Wednesday, September 30th. Please note that the event at CityRealty will be held on Wednesday, October 7th. The conference takes place over three days from October 6-9th.
More details on the event this way
September 25, 2015

Watch Videos of Morgan Stanley’s New Times Square LED Screens That Replaced Its Iconic Zipper

Last week, Morgan Stanley unveiled a set of seven modernized LED signs at the base of its headquarters building at 1585 Broadway in Times Square. The digital billboards, which took five months to replace, feature six million LED pixels that can display up to 281 trillion colors. The screens replace the iconic amber ticker that stood at the lower three floors of the Gwathmey, Siegel & Associates-designed building for more than 20 years. Since the sign was inspired by similar signage at Bloomberg's 731 Lexington Avenue, the bank spent nine months working with Bloomberg's internal creative agency to develop its content. With custom-built technology by British-based Framestore, the screens can display updated imagery and data at all times. The sign's fact sheet (PDF) notes that the displays will be operational 19 hours a day and will display 2,100 pieces of distinct content, including 855 news headlines and real-time data of eight global indices.
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September 25, 2015

Gorgeous Brooklyn Townhouse Featured on the Cover of House Beautiful Asks $4.5 Million

Get ready to swoon. This Carroll Gardens townhouse at 396 Sackett Street was restored and renovated in 2011 by the Brooklyn firm Baxt Ingui Architects, and it is still looking fine. Gorgeous details, high ceilings, big windows and a fancy kitchen—what's not to like? The listing even says the home earned the cover of House Beautiful back in 2013. This impressive townhouse could be all yours, as long as you've got $4.5 million to spare.
Take a look around
September 24, 2015

Wild Walk, an Upstate Treetop Trail, Was Inspired by the High Line

The High Line has inspired countless urban projects, from local ideas like the QueensWay to international schemes like the Chapultepec Project in Mexico City, but it's not as often that we see the elevated park cited as inspiration for rural projects. But that's the case for Wild Walk, an upstate treetop trail nestled in the Adirondacks, according to Dezeen. The trail is located at the Wild Center, a 79-acre nature reserve within Adirondack Park, the largest natural park in the lower 48 states. Wild Walk is elevated between 30 and 40 feet off the ground and is a series of bridges and paths supported by pointed towers made from pre-rusted steel tubes, which resemble the cabin-like architecture one would expect to find in the mountains.
Learn all about this treetop trail
September 22, 2015

Downtown’s Beekman Residences Tower Is Ready for Its Crowns – Now 50 Percent Sold

Rising from the birthplace of the romantic skyscraper, a svelte 51-story condominium known as the Beekman Residences will soon receive its twin pyramidal crowns. The to-be-illuminated, open-air pinnacles will bring the building's 599-foot roof height up an additional 51 feet, granting us skyline-watchers a new silhouette to gaze upon. While the tower's height is unremarkable in today's world of kilometer-high skyscrapers (it's only the 24th tallest building now under construction in the city), its peculiar design and prominent location overlooking Park Row is sure to add to the exceptional urban room created by the variously-styled towers surrounding City Hall Park.
More details ahead
September 8, 2015

Historic Brooklyn Heights Site May Be Redeveloped Into 40-Story Condominium

Concept studies by the design firm SRA Architecture + Engineering (SRAA+E) reveal that an existing five-story commercial building in Downtown Brooklyn may be redeveloped into a dramatic retail and condominium tower. The prominent 19,000-square-foot, triangular site at 205 Montague Street is located at the gateway of Brooklyn Heights and currently holds a 1960s-era marble and glass office-retail building that was picked up by Joseph Cayre's Midtown Equities back in 2010. In 2012, the development firm filed permits doubling the building's size, envisioning a 100-unit residence that would convert the structure's three upper levels into apartments and add another six stories above. The permits, also filed by SRAA+E, were never approved, but in 2012 an insider told the Brooklyn Eagle, “an awful lot more can be built than what's in the Buildings Department plans." Midtown Equities, who is also busy rebuilding the Empire Stores in Brooklyn Bridge Park, could not be reached for comment.
Find out more about this possible project
September 3, 2015

Get All Your Local Foodie News in This New Interactive Map

If you're a regular 6sqft reader you know that real estate and architecture news here in NYC moves at the speed of light. Projects change architects overnight; celebrities are constantly buying and selling their multi-million-dollar pads; and it seems like everyday there's a new development announcement. The gastronomy crowd can make the same claim, though, as restaurants constantly open and close, chefs come in and out, and the food of the moment goes from cronut to fried chicken sandwich in a matter of days. To help foodies stay up on their news, Blockfeed, a news app that uses geographic location to determine one's feed, has created the Food News in NYC map, a five-borough interactive platform that provides local food happenings (h/t DNAinfo). According to the site, "This map frees you to explore the last 60 days of food news in NYC, amounting to roughly 3,000 articles about new restaurants, festivals, pop-ups, nightlife, and more."
More on the map