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Dizzying Designs

By Matt Chaban 1/17 1:40pm

Dizzying Designs

5 Photos

Commodore Foster

A Million Little Tiles: Foster + Partners Design Understated Showroom on Madison Square Park

Lord Norman Foster, the hyper-modern British Pritzker Prize winner, is having a moment in New York, with numerous projects underway across Manhattan. But his latest hews away from the slick techno-futurism for which Lord Foster is best known, instead embracing a city landmark at one of our most famous intersections.

Last July, Spansh tile maker Porcelanosa, one of that nation’s largest producers of tiles and ceramics, purchased 202 Fifth Avenue for $40 million. Better known as the Commodore Criterion Building, the six-story granite structure once housed the Commodore Manufacturing Corp. and Criterion Bell & Specialty Co., two Brooklyn-based Christmas ornament makers (hence the building’s best known feature, a troupe of carolers permanently affixed to the second-story facade). Now, the 18,000-square-foot building will house Porcelanosa’s U.S. flagship, with interiors designed by Foster + Partners. Read More

By Matt Chaban 5:55pm

Dizzying Designs

Big, pointy apartments. (Durst/Fetner)

BIG News: Planning Commission Approves Durst’s 57th Street Pyramid Apartments

When Douglas Durst began deciding, yet again, what to do with the almost block-long property he owns at 57th Street and the Hudson River, City Planning Commissioner Amanda Burden urged the developer to think big. A high-tech data center, a school and a hotel had all fallen through, so Mr. Durst had fallen back on that most reliable form of New York City development: housing.

Ms. Burden wanted something iconic, especially for a project on such a prominent street at such a prominent location right on the waterfront. With Hudson River Park right there, it ought to be iconic. Mr. Durst delivered something BIG indeed, hiring the Danish wunderkinds at Bjarke Ingles Group to design his project.

Yesterday, Ms. Burden got to put her official stamp on the project, when she and the rest of the City Planning Commission approved Durst/Fetner’s BIG pyramid. Read More

By Matt Chaban 9/24/12 2:39pm

Dizzying Designs

Hello, Central Park.

Just How Many Skinny Luxury Towers Can We Jam Onto 57th Street? Well, Here’s Another 51-Story Doozy

Forget Park Avenue, forget Central Park West, forget Bond Street. Pretty soon, 57th Street is going to be the place to live in New York.

Already we have the uber-hyped One57, where billionaires buy condos pushing $100 million. The taller-than-1WTC 432 Park is just beginning to rise a few blocks away, with the recent revelations its penthouse will be asking $85 million. And at some point in time, Gary Barnett, the man responsible for One57, will begin work on another luxury tower on the corner of Broadway and 57th Street.

As if that were not enough, here comes a 51-story bolt of luxury to the heart of Manhattan. Read More

By Matt Chaban 9/21/12 5:51pm

Dizzying Designs

8 Photos

Starchitect Switcheroo

Starchitect Switcheroo! Will the Upper West Side Get Any Pritzker-Worthy Buildings at Riverside Center?

Has the Upper West Side fallen for an eight-acre bait and switch?

At least one and possibly all five towers at the massive Riverside Center development will not be the work of Pritzker Prize-winning architect Christian de Portzamparc. The French designer helped Extell Development and the Carlyle Group sell their swank plans‘ to the community and the City Planning Commission. The latter was so taken with the crystalline designs of Mr. de Portzamparc, who also designed the LVMH headquarters and Extell’s One57 tower, that restrictive zoning covenants were set to ensure the buildings would look as promised.

But now, Extell and Carlyle have turned over one of their tower sites to the Dermot Company, which has hired local firm SLCE to design the apartment building on the West End Avenue section of the site. While Dermot insists its project will be up to the standards promised during last year’s public review process, some, including the exacting City Planning chair Amanda Burden, worry the design doppelgangers will lead to lesser work. Read More

By Matt Chaban 9/17/12 5:10pm

Dizzying Designs

If you build it... actually, please don't. (wongbooks.com)

Just What Chinatown Needs, a 2,173-Foot Tower of Insanity Created by Some Retired Local

“Ordinary People, Middle Class, The Rich & Government Officials. All live in Harmony under the Same Sky. To Generate a Utopian Society with Great Dreams.”

Is this some zen koan? A communist manifesto? The message inside a fortune cookie? No, it is the introduction, and the vision, to a 120 page pamphlet proposing a 128-story mega skyscraper covering some five blocks in the heart of Chinatown. Think the World Trade Center meets that crazy hotel in Pyongyang. It is the work of a humble man, retiree Wong San Yan, his gift to the neighborhood he loves. Read More

By Matt Chaban 9/12/12 3:38pm

Dizzying Designs

8 Photos

Hava Nagila: A Song for the People

Everybody Hava Nagilah! Groovy Installation Celebrates History of Judaism’s Favorite Song

Even if you’re not Jewish, you probably know the song “Hava Nagilah.” It is up there in the canon with “If I Were a Rich Man” and “The Chanukah Song.” Just thinking those words, hava nagilah, you’ve probably already started humming to yourself, clapping your hands, maybe even grabbing the nearest chair and hoisting it over your head. The point is, it is a powerful, meaningful song, rivaling the Macarena.

It is this popularity, this ubiquity that inspired a new exhibition/installation at the Museum of Jewish Heritage, Hava Nagila: A Song for the People. The show brings together the sights, sounds and spirit of the song, its rich temporal and psychic history, and fills them into a colorful, carpeted room at the museum designed by hot young Brooklyn designers Situ Studio and MTWTF. Read More

By Chloe Ashby 9/10/12 4:11pm

Dizzying Designs

Meds and eds and cool designs. (CUNY)

A Healthy Architectural Addition: CUNY and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Building New East Side Facilities

New York City, forever expanding its architectural and medical offerings, is about to add two contemporary healthcare centers to the hospital corridor along the East Side of Manhattan, in a prominent location right on the shore. It will further highlight the city’s position not only at the forefront of the nation’s medical establishment but also within the design leadership.

This morning, Mayor Bloomberg, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, CUNY and Hunter College announced plans to build two new science and medical facilities in a new millio-square-foot building on the Upper East Side. They reflect the Bloomberg Administration’s efforts to expand science and research activity in New York City at a timely moment when the city’s science, technology and research fields are flourishing. Read More

By Matt Chaban 9/07/12 5:09pm

Dizzying Designs

7 Photos

Lobbying for Change at 1290 A of A

Vornado Sprucing Up 1290 Avenue of the Americas With New Lobby

Even if it may be losing Microsoft to the brand new 11 Times Square nearby, 1290 Avenue of the Americas is about to get buffed up itself to appeal to tenants (including those who might be in the market for some 100,000 square feet of space that may soon be sitting vacant). Vornado, the owners of 1290 A of A, have just announced the beginning of construction for a new lobby and plaza renovation that will modernize and improve the appearance of the 43-story building at the street level. Read More