Etihad Park
HOK · Willets Point · 2027
Southwest corner from Seaver Way.
Superstructure has topped out at Etihad Park, the new home of New York City FC in Willets Point, Queens. Designed by HOK, the rectangular volume of the 25,000 seat stadium sits adjacent to Citi Field. This will be the first fully electric stadium in Major League Soccer and the first fully electric professional sports stadium in New York City. There will also be a rain water harvesting system underneath the playing surface to aid in irrigation.
Southwest corner from Seaver Way.
Steel framing of the seven-story entryway, The Cube.
West facade from Seaver Way.
The Cube entryway.
Northwest corner from Seaver Way.
Architect: HOK; Construction: Turner Construction; Program: Soccer Stadium, Retail; Location: Willets Point, Queens, NY; Completion: 2027.
Etihad Park
HOK · Willets Point · 2027
Southwest corner from Seaver Way.
Superstructure is ongoing at Etihad Park, the new home of New York City FC in Willets Point, Queens. Designed by HOK, the rectangular volume of the 25,000 seat stadium sits adjacent to Citi Field. This will be the first fully electric stadium in Major League Soccer and the first fully electric professional sports stadium in New York City. There will also be a rain water harvesting system underneath the playing surface to aid in irrigation.
Steel framing of the seven-story entryway, The Cube.
West facade from Seaver Way.
The Cube entryway.
Northwest corner from Seaver Way.
Architect: HOK; Construction: Turner Construction; Program: Soccer Stadium, Retail; Location: Willets Point, Queens, NY; Completion: 2027.
Construction Update: 550 Washington Street - Google NYC - St. John's Terminal
Northeast corner.
Construction has wrapped up at Oxford Properties’ conversion of St. John’s Terminal, originally constructed in 1934, into the offices of Google at 550 Washington Street on the west side of Manhattan. Led by COOKFOX Architects, the project re-imagines the former terminus of the New York Central Railroad’s West Side viaduct into 1.3 million square feet of office space for Google. Nine new floors have been added atop the existing structure that stretched for two city blocks.
Northwest corner from Washington Street.
Northwest corner from West Street.
Northwest corner from West Street.
Southwest corner from West Street.
Close-up of the curtain wall panels at the west facade.
80 Clarkson and 570 Washington
Foundation work is underway at the adjacent site which will feature two residential towers from developers Zeckendorf Development, Atlas Capital, and The Baupost Group. Designed by COOKFOX Architects with SLCE Architects, the 36-story tower at 80 Clarkson Street will offer 271 condo units, while the 29-story tower at 570 Washington Street will offer 169 affordable senior apartments. The towers will rise on what was once the northern half of the St. John’s Terminal structure, which was demolished in 2019.
Architects (550 Washington): COOKFOX Architects, Adamson Associates, and Gensler (Interiors); Structural Engineer (550 Washington): Gilsanz Murray Steficek; Landscape Architect (550 Washington): Future Green Studio; General Contractors (550 Washington): Structure Tone and Turner Construction; Developers: Oxford Properties Group (550 Washington); Zeckendorf Development, Atlas Capital, and The Baupost Group (80 Clarkson and 570 Washington); Program: Office (550 Washington), Residential Condo (80 Clarkson), Senior Housing (570 Washington); Location: Hudson Square, New York, NY; Completion: 2024 (550 Washington); 2026 (80 Clarkson and 570 Washington).
Construction Update: 181 Mercer Street
Southeast corner from Houston Street.
Facade installation is ongoing at NYU’s 23-story mixed use building 181 Mercer at the northern edge of SoHo. Designed by KieranTimberlake and Davis Brody Bond, the full block structure features faculty and student housing, 58 classrooms, performing arts spaces including a 350-seat theater, a student commons space on the second floor, and athletic facilities at the base. Installation of the pleated glass curtain wall with glare reducing frit patterns is nearly finished at the podium and panels are going up on the towers.
Northeast corner.
Looking up at the south facade from Houston Street.
Southwest corner from Houston Street.
Close-up of the south podium facade.
Southwest corner from Houston Street.
Southwest corner from Houston Street.
West facade of 181 Mercer (right) and Picasso’s Bust of Sylvette (left) from NYU’s Silver Towers.
Architects: KieranTimberlake and Davis Brody Bond; Client: New York University (NYU); Program: Faculty and Student Housing, Classrooms, Performing Arts, Athletic Facility, and Commons; Location: SoHo, New York, NY; Completion: 2021.
Tour: Museum of Modern Art Renovation and Expansion
The Museum of Modern Art is ready for it’s reopening later this month, with expanded gallery space, renovations to existing entry and gallery spaces, and a new museum store.
Designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Gensler, the MoMA’s expansion occupies two sites to the west of the existing museum. Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects‘ Folk Art Museum occupied the first site from its completion in 2001 until demolition in 2014. The rest of the expansion is located in the base of the adjacent Jean Nouvel tower 53 West 53.
The museum’s main entrance is now marked by a large cantilevered metal canopy at West 53rd Street. Inside, the lobby ceiling height has been raised and the museum store has been relocated one floor below to open up views outward from the lobby. Ticketing desks have also been installed in new locations in the ground floor lobby.
A new blade stair serves as the circulation spine of the new gallery spaces in the west expansion. A solid six inch divider hangs from the roof structure to support the bead blast stainless steel panels and solid northern oak treads and risers. Glass balustrades are cantilevered off of the stair and held in place by pins. The walls of the stairway are clad in bird’s eye maple with acoustic micro-perforations. A separate blackened stainless steel stair at the sixth floor leads to the cafe.
The museum’s expansion includes 47,000 square feet of new and renovated gallery space. Along with the five floors of new gallery space in the west building, some of the galleries added in the Taniguchi expansion of 2004 have also been renovated and reconfigured.
Architects: Diller Scofidio + Renfro in collaboration with Gensler; Client: The Museum of Modern Art; Program: Museum; Location: Midtown, New York, NY; Completion: October 2019.
Tour: Cornell Tech Campus
Northwest corner of the Cornell Tech campus.
The first phase of the new campus for Cornell Tech on Roosevelt Island has officially for the fall semester. Established under a partnership between Cornell University and the Israel Institute of Technology, Cornell Tech serves as a graduate school for applied sciences that hopes to nurture the future of New York's growing tech industry. When the full master plan is realized in 2043, the completed campus will house 2 million square feet of space and 12 acres of open space for approximately 2,500 occupants.
Campus signage.
The Bloomberg Center
The Bloomberg Center, designed by Morphosis, serves as the main academic building for the first phase of the Cornell Tech campus. Faculty and students will be able to work independently and collaboratively in the building’s flexible space. Interaction with the public will be facilitated through the café and terrace. As with the other buildings on campus, The Bloomberg Center will pursue aggressive sustainability standards as it sets a goal of being the largest Net Zero energy use building in the United States. All of its energy will be generated on site through the use of geothermal wells for heating and cooling and a canopy of solar panels at the roof.
North façade of The Bloomberg Center.
Looking up at the east façade of The Bloomberg Center.
Southeast corner of The Bloomberg Center.
Morphosis has designed an iconic metal panel façade to cover the unitized, continuously insulated rainscreen wall system. A system of perforations in the panels catches the sunlight to create an organic pattern visible on campus and from afar.
Looking up at the south façade of The Bloomberg Center.
Southwest corner of The Bloomberg Center.
Close-up of the perforated metal panel façade of The Bloomberg Center.
The Bridge at Cornell Tech
The Bridge at Cornell Tech, designed by Weiss/Manfredi and developed by Forest City Ratner Companies, will serve as a corporate co-location facility to bring together established tech companies, startups, and academic researchers to accelerate the introduction of new technologies to the market. The 230,000 square foot building will pursue a minimum of LEED Silver with sustainable features such as 16,500 square feet of rooftop solar panels, efficient water fixtures, stormwater capture, and a ground floor elevated 10 feet above the 100 year flood plane. A glass curtain wall with a vertical frit pattern clads the steel structure, offering expansive light and views to the 14 foot floor to floor height work spaces.
Northeast corner of The Bridge.
Southwest corner of The Bridge.
Close-up of the façade of The Bridge.
Lobby of The Bridge.
The House at Cornell Tech
The House at Cornell Tech, designed by Handel Architects and developed in partnership with The Hudson Companies and The Related Companies, will offer 350 residential units for students and faculty of the college. Rising to a height of 270 feet, the tower is the tallest building on campus and will be the world’s tallest Passive House designed structure at completion. The Passive House energy standard was developed in Germany and is considered the most rigorous energy efficiency standard in the world. Buildings designed to this standard typically achieve energy consumption reduction of 60% to 80% that of a similar code building.
Northwest corner of The House.
Looking up at the south façade of The House.
As part of the energy efficient design of the building, the façade is clad in unitized mega panels of metal panel and punched windows that are designed and prefabricated for better control of air infiltration, reducing heating and cooling loss. A special color changing paint is employed on the metal panels that will shift from silver to warm champagne in the natural light. The southwest corner of the façade features a vertical strip of louvers that act as the building’s “gills”, concealing the outdoor space where the heating and cooling equipment are housed.
Residential entry at The House.
Amenities will include furnished common spaces, fitness center, landscaped ground floor porch and rooftop terraces, rooftop party room, and bicycle storage.
Southwest corner of The House.
Architects: SOM (Master Plan, Central Utility Plant), Landscape Architects: Field Operations (Open Space Master Plan, Campus Open Space); Location: Roosevelt Island, New York, NY; Completion: 2017.
BLOOMBERG CENTER:
Architect: Morphosis; Structural Engineer: Arup; MEP Engineer: Arup; Facade Consultant: Arup; Client: Cornell University; Program: Education.
THE BRIDGE AT CORNELL TECH:
Architect: Weiss/Manfredi; Program: Office.
THE HOUSE AT CORNELL TECH:
Architect: Handel Architects; Structural Engineer: Buro Happold; MEP Engineer: Buro Happold; Facade Consultant: Socotec; Sustainability and Passive House Consultant: Steven Winter Associates; General Contractor: Monadnock Construction; Client: Cornell University, Related Companies, Hudson Companies; Program: Residential.
Cornell Tech Campus
Superstructure rises at all building sites in the first phase of Cornell University's tech-focused new campus on Roosevelt Island in New York.
Superstructure has started to rise at the phase one sites of Cornell's new tech campus on Roosevelt Island. The site is located to the south of the Ed Koch Queensboro Bridge and was formerly home to the Goldwater Hospital, which housed 2,106 beds. Included in the first phase of construction is an academic building by Morphosis, a corporate co-location building by Weiss/Manfredi, a residential tower by Handel Architects, a meeting center for the academic and tech community, a central utility building by SOM, and a campus plaza by Field Operations.
Located on a triangular site at the northwest corner of the campus, the four-story, 160,000-square-foot Bloomberg Center will house the school's initial academic functions. Bronze toned metal panels will clad the exterior, while a roof covered in photovoltaic panels crowns the top floor. The building has been designed with the goal of achieving Net-Zero energy consumption and a LEED Platinum certification. Superstructure has reached the fourth floor, making topping out eminent.
To the east of the Bloomberg Center, the Bridge at Cornell Tech serves as a corporate co-location building. The Weiss/Manfredi designed building will provide space for new and established companies to work on innovative projects. Superstructure has reached the second floor.
Aerial view of the Phase One campus from the Roosevelt Island tram.
Aerial view of the Phase One campus from the Roosevelt Island tram.
Aerial view of the Phase One campus from the Roosevelt Island tram.
Northwest corner of the Bloomberg Center by Morphosis.
At the northern boundary of the site lies the Central Utility Plant and the residential tower. The one story utility building features a sawtooth facade, clad in metal panels, that faces the North Loop Road. An unoccupiable green roof covers the top. The Hudson Companies' 26-story, 270-foot-tall residential tower stands adjacent to the utility building and will provide 350 residential units to mostly graduate students. Handel Architects has designed the tower to the Passive House sustainability standards, making it the world's tallest project to use such standards. The Central Utility Plant has topped out, while the residential tower has reached its second floor.
North facade of the Central Utility Plant by SOM.
Northwest corner of the Central Utility Plant.
North facade of the Central Utility Plant by SOM.
Northeast corner of the Phase One campus with the Residential Building (center) and the Central Utility Plant (right).
Northeast corner of the Residential Building by Handel Architects.
Work on the first phase of the campus is schedule for completion by 2017.
Architects: SOM (Master Plan, Central Utility Plant), Morphosis (The Bloomberg Center), Weiss/Manfredi (The Bridge at Cornell Tech), Handel Architects (Residential Tower); Landscape Architects: Field Operations (Campus Plaza); Program: Education, Office, Residential, Open Space; Location: Roosevelt Island, New York, NY; Completion: 2017.
Whitney Museum of American Art
Ungainly and awkward, the Whitney's $422 million, 220,000-square-foot new home asserts its presence at the High Line's southern edge. Renzo Piano's addition to the Meatpacking neighborhood is indicative of the district's decade-long transformation from working class industrial to trendy tourist destination. What started in the previous decade with the conversion of unused elevated train tracks into the High Line elevated park, has culminated in a major new museum for the city in a neighborhood now dominated by buildings from an elite group of architects.
The Whitney Museum of American Art, begun with a collection of artwork amassed by Gertrude Whitney in 1908, has called several places home in its first century of existence. Most recently the museum was located on the Upper East Side, in a building designed by Marcel Breuer in 1966, at the corner of Madison Avenue and East 75th Street. Breuer's building, with its stone clad, inverted ziggurat form, was also considered at its opening to be awkward and panned for its unusual massing. With time, the building gained acceptance but was never able to adequately hold the museum's vast collection.
The Whitney Museum by Marcel Breuer, 1966.
Many attempts were made to expand the museum at its Upper East Side location, with designs from Norman Foster, Michael Graves, OMA, and finally Renzo Piano. Given the scale of the neighborhood and the historic value of buildings on site and adjacent, large scale expansion plans proved too contentious to realize.
With the advent of the High Line in 2009, properties that surrounded the park gained new value and the exodus of industrial businesses in the area left behind many sites ripe for new construction. Realizing the futility of its expansion plans at the Breuer building, the Whitney brokered a deal with the city of New York for a site at the southern entrance to the High Line and occupied by a meatpacking business. While the business has remained on the northern half of the massive site, the Whitney's deal with the city allows them to acquire the remaining half should the business relocate elsewhere.
Program study models.
Massing study models.
Presentation model of final design.
The Whitney Museum by Marcel Breuer, 1966.
Piano's building is arranged with gallery spaces and other public functions in the southern half, while offices for the museum's staff, education programs, and other support spaces occupy the northern half. At the primary public corner, where Gansevoort intersects Washington Street, the Whitney engages the public at both street level and the High Line as the building's form folds skyward at the corner of Gansevoort and Washington Street, creating a multi-story volume enclosed by vast expanses of glass. Piano uses this element in conjunction with the more solidly clad galleries cantilevered above to subtly invoke the Breuer building's iconic massing, a motif that will reoccur throughout. The folded facade also evokes Diller Scofidio + Renfro's overhaul of Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hull (renovated, 2009), where a double height entry is also formed by peeling up the building's original travertine facade. For the Whitney, this space houses Danny Meyer's latest restaurant, Untitled. Stretching along the restaurant's Gansevoort Street frontage, the open kitchen visually dominates the space. At night, the scene from the street is reminiscent of Edward Hopper's Nighthawks, with the patrons spread out along the bar and the glow of Robert Indiana's illuminated word "EAT" artwork hanging above.
Southeast corner of the Whitney (left) and the southern entrance to the High Line (right).
Untitled restaurant from Gansevoort Street.
Restaurant entrance off of Gansevoort Street.
View of the restaurant bar from Gansevoort Street.
Main museum entrance from Gansevoort Street.
View of the museum shop at the southwest corner from Gansevoort Street.
Museum visitors enter mid-block off of Gansevoort Street into a glass enclosed 6,000 square-foot lobby that is adjacent to a free gallery and a museum shop consisting of open shelving to maintain visual porosity. Galleries on the upper floors can be accessed by a grand stair or by one of four elevators, featuring commissioned artwork in the elevator cab by the artist Richard Artschwager. Glazing above the elevator entry at ground level allows the visitor to see the machinery needed to operate, continuing an oft used theme by Piano. The concrete and steel of the stair serves as another subtle reference to the Breuer building.
Main museum entrance from Gansevoort Street.
Museum lobby.
Museum shop shelving.
Special exhibitions are housed on the eighth floor, which currently features "America is Hard to See." The show serves as a means for the Whitney to reexamine American art since 1900 with works from their vast collection that has long gone unseen. The galleries at this level feature the typical white walls and reclaimed wide-plank pine flooring found throughout the museum. Because of its top floor location, Piano has designed the ceilings as a grid work that allows in light from the sawtooth skylights, resulting in a much brighter and inviting environment to wander the galleries than the Breuer building. There, the dark tones of the stone flooring and the concrete waffle ceiling gave the galleries a heavy and dark atmosphere. Although Piano's galleries are a sharp turn from the previous aesthetic, he continually references the Breuer ceilings with the varying take on grids created at each level of galleries. On some floors the ceiling grid is present but solid while other floors reveal the conduit and ductwork of necessary services in a modern building, a muted and vertical take on Piano's first museum, the Pompidou.
On floors six and seven reside the permanent collection galleries in spaces unmatched by their previous home. Now visitors can peruse the work in vast spaces that give the pieces enough real estate to stand on their own but still create a dialogue with adjacent works. With the added space comes spectacular moments of rest and reflection, where visitors can sit at one of two large walls of glass and take in the High Line in the morning light from the east facade or the setting sun from the west facade's window. Moments of connection to the surrounding neighborhood can even be experienced while in the midst of perusing the galleries, as slots of space cut through gallery walls leading to the facade's glazing.
Not to be outdone, the 13,000-square-feet of outdoor galleries and terraces provide additional opportunities to pause and reflect. Views of the city skyline serve as a backdrop to outdoor cafe seating and several large sculptures. On the fifth floor outdoor gallery, the Whitney has commissioned a site specific work by Mary Heilmann, Mary Heilmann: Sunset, which features colorful chairs scattered about the terrace that visitors can use. Also included is a projected film and panels of colorful shapes that mimic the stepping of the building's terraces.
At the northern half of the building, Piano has located the support space for the Whitney's staff, which has grown steadily in recent years. Like the galleries, these spaces are generous in size and provide ample light and views to the neighborhood.
With the opening of the Whitney, the city has gained another spectacular cultural destination. Yes, it's exterior is a quirky wrapper, more muscle than beauty, but the interior more than compensates with its spot on take on the contemporary museum. Piano expertly crafts a museum that accommodates the visitor with the right mix of galleries and leisure space, allowing the museum to coexist with, rather than be consumed by, the commercial program of contemporary institutions. Like the Breuer building, Piano's structure will likely be embraced by most over time, as visitors forgive its exterior clumsiness for the expertly crafted experience within.
Architect: Renzo Piano Building Workshop (Design Architect), Cooper Robertson (Executive Architect); Structural Engineer: Robert Silman Associates: MEP Engineer: Jaros, Baum & Bolles; Facade Consultant: Heintges; Landscape Architect: Piet Oudolf with Mathews Nielson Landscape Architect; General Contractor: Turner Construction; Client: Whitney Museum of American Art; Program: Museum; Location: Meatpacking District, New York, NY; Completion: 2015.