Archinect - News

PAU-designed The Refinery at Domino reopens Brooklyn's most iconic building to the modern workplace

2023-09-27T15:25:00-04:00

A landmark era of high-profile additions and architectural changes to the historic Brooklyn waterfront has ushered in a new chapter with today’s official public unveiling of the PAU-designed The Refinery at Domino office component at the 11-acre former Domino Sugar Factory site in Williamsburg.

The new, 15-story glass commercial space was constructed inside the building’s old brick masonry shell, offering tenants 460,000 square feet of Class A office space enhanced by carefully-inserted biophilic elements and marked by the firm’s attenuation to ascendant health and wellness considerations typical in modern workplace design.

Photo: Max Touhey

A 12-foot gap left between the new and old structures provides space for Field Operations’s 17-count in-house arboretum while standardizing a misalignment with the floors and helping to flood the bonetti/kozerski-designed office interiors with natural light and expanded access to vegetation throughout the day.

Photo: Max Touhey

A vaulted 27,000-s...

Biophilic installation begins at Brooklyn's Domino Sugar Factory, including 17 big trees

2023-04-10T14:55:00-04:00

In advance of the expected project completion later this summer, the Brooklyn-based developer Two Trees Management has shared images of its recent installation of the biophilic program inside PAU’s long-awaited Domino Sugar Refinery redevelopment in Williamsburg.

The installation comprises 17 30-foot trees, each weighing more than 10,000 pounds, that make up the core of the project’s indoor vertical garden component, which highlights the 460,000 square feet of new office space being created inside the iconic 19th-century waterfront structure.

Image © Wes Tarca

Each tree had to first be carefully hoisted above the roofline of the refinery and then “surgically” placed inside via a 12-foot-wide opening between the brick facade and envelope of the 27,000-square-foot all-glass office addition located further within.

Image © Wes Tarca

The overall $250 million project began in 2014 and includes the James Corner Field Operations-designed Domino Park segment i...

Brooklyn’s historic Domino Sugar Factory restoration lights up with signs of progress

2022-12-28T13:29:00-05:00

A beloved monument returned to the Brooklyn skyline without pomp or circumstance last night when the Domino Sugar sign was quietly relit atop the Thomas Havemeyer building’s new barrel vaulted glass roof, illuminating the Williamsburg waterfront for the first time in eight years. It also marked one last milestone in 2022 for redevelopment at the former refinery, which was last open to the public in 2014

Meanwhile, PAU’s portion of the $250 million Domino Sugar Factory project is nearing completion with the placement of the structural steelwork required to support the 27,000-square-foot glass addition slotted into its 140-year-old interior.

Image © Wes Tarca

New York YIMBY also reported that construction of the reinforced concrete core is complete as well. The tree-lined and column-free office portion is yet to be fully leased in spite of the space’s considerable marketability. The full restoration is expected to be ready sometime in the next year.

PAU Studio unveils updated plans for Domino Sugar Refinery in Brooklyn

2019-08-14T16:30:00-04:00

When the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) approved the conversion of the 137-year-old Domino Sugar Refinery in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, the development quickly became one of the most talked about construction projects in the borough. Practice for Architecture and Urbanism (PAU), the architects responsible for the visionary renovation, will return this week to the LPC with changes for its previously approved design.

Domino Sugar Factory's waterfront park prepares for grand opening in Brooklyn

2018-06-06T14:25:00-04:00

A dramatic shift is underway on the Williamsburg waterfront: The ruins of the former Domino Sugar Refinery, a neighborhood landmark since the 19th century, are in the process of being transformed into an 11-acre megaproject. Four new buildings are on the way, as is a renovation of the massive factory building [...] Domino Park, a six-acre green space that hugs the edge of the development, opens on June 10.

Curbed New York documents the transformation of the former Domino Sugar Factory where one piece of the massive revitalization—the James Corner Field Operations-designed Domino Park—will open to the public this Sunday. (Prepare for spectacular views of the Manhattan skyline.)

REVEALED: New renderings of Domino Sugar Factory’s waterfront park and esplanade

2018-04-05T20:27:00-04:00

New renderings have been revealed for Domino Park, the 11-acre park and waterfront esplanade that will anchor the three-million-square-foot Williamsburg mega-development at the Domino Sugar Factory site, and they showcase everything from an urban “beach” to a better look at how preserved artifacts from the historic factory will be incorporated throughout. Designed by James Corner Field Operations (of the High Line fame), the park is scheduled to open this summer, ahead of most of the buildings.

Via James Corner Field Operations

First glimpse at the Domino Sugar Factory's new residential building, designed by SHoP Architects

2018-02-13T15:25:00-05:00

325 Kent by SHoP Architects is the first new structure to open at the 11-acre Domino Sugar Factory, which is being redeveloped by Vishaan Chakrabarti's Practice for Architecture and Urbanism.

Photo: Adrian Gaut.

Located at the Williamsburg waterfront, the residential building stands at 16 stories tall and is clad in a zinc facade on the upper floors and in copper on the lower floors. It features a large architectural opening that is capped by a 3-story bridge that contains the building's core amenities. The building accommodates 522 units, with 104 of them affordable to low-income residents.

Photo: Adrian Gaut.

Photo: Daniel Levin.

Outside, Leeser Architecture designed a 7,000 square-foot roof deck overlooking the Williamsburg Bridge, as well as a 2,000 square-foot courtyard on the fourth floor. At the front of the building, the Domino Park, designed by James Corner Field Operations, will pay tribute to the site's industrial h...

Vishaan Chakrabarti reveals new designs for Domino Sugar Factory

2017-10-04T11:09:00-04:00

Vishaan Chakrabarti‘s Practice for Architecture and Urbanism (PAU) has revealed a new set of renderings for the refinery building at the three million-square-foot Domino Sugar Factory mega-development in Williamsburg. The new plans are brighter and better connected than those previously approved by the Landmarks Preservation Commission.

PAU design for the Domino Refinery. Image courtesy of Practice for Architecture and Urbanism.

News via 6sqft

First look at Domino Sugar Factory’s 11-acre park and waterfront esplanade

2017-04-20T18:17:00-04:00

James Corner Field Operations will preserve 21 Raw Sugar Warehouse columns, nearly 600 feet of crane tracks, and 30 industrial artifacts, including 36-foot-tall syrup tanks that were used in the refining process, mooring bollards, and bucket elevators–not dissimilar from their efforts at the High Line.

Two Trees Management has revealed new details and renderings of the 11-acre park that will anchor their Williamsburg mega-development at the Domino Sugar Factory site. Domino Park, which will open in the summer of 2018, will have a new waterfront esplanade, six acres of parkland, and a wealth of preserved artifact.

Domino Sugar Factory reveals renderings of creative office building The Refinery

2016-10-28T12:23:00-04:00

The first set of renderings have been revealed for Two Trees' new 380,000-square-foot office building at Williamsburg‘s massive, under-construction Domino Sugar Factory complex. The images highlight how tenants can work with architects Beyer Blinder Belle to customize their spaces for “innovation” and “authenticity” in The Refinery. The interiors preserve the former industrial details, while incorporating creative perks such as suspended glass-and-steel office pods and an indoor skate park.

HAO’s idea proposal to revive Brooklyn’s old Domino Sugar Factory into cultural destination

2013-11-25T15:34:00-05:00

Holm Architecture Office was recently commissioned for an idea proposal to revive the existing buildings of the Domino Sugar Factory in the Williamsburg neighborhood in Brooklyn, New York. The factory opened in 1856 and was once the sugar processing center of the U.S. before it shut down in 2004. The factory has been empty since then.

All images courtesy of Holm Architecture Office.

Hello Dubai-on-the-East-River

2013-03-04T19:02:00-05:00

In recent years developers putting up a forest of residential towers have been accused of turning the Brooklyn and Queens waterfront into Miami-on-the-East-River. With his new plan for the 11-acre Domino Sugar refinery in Williamsburg officially unveiled on Sunday, Jed Walentas has crafted something that might better be described as Dubai-on-the-East-River.

Audacious new waterfront development designed by SHoP unveiled in Brooklyn. Transforms derelict Domino Sugar refinery into 24/7 community with designs the likes of which New York has never seen.