Archinect - News

The Vessel to reopen with improved safety measures

2024-04-15T11:44:00-04:00

The Vessel has announced it will again be open to visitors in New York City later this year after upgraded anti-suicide safety measures are installed in response to a spate of tragedies that have befallen its existence since being inaugurated in March of 2019. The attraction has been closed since 2021 and will reopen with its uppermost level kept inaccessible to the public.

The New York Times reported a representative from Related Companies, which manages the Thomas Heatherwick-designed property, as saying a “floor-to-ceiling steel mesh” barrier would be installed. It will replace existing barriers that were only waste-high and not "cut-proof," as the new fencing is understood to be made.

"While we think it took Related four lives too many to make these physical adjustments, these are the changes we requested, which will allow for prioritizing the safety of everyone who visits the Vessel," Manhattan Communit...

This is what Hudson Yards West will look like, according to developers

2024-03-15T13:25:00-04:00

Details of the planned Wynn New York City resort scheme from Related Companies and the Oxford Properties Group have been released, along with new renderings and further details about the final Phase 2 building segment at Hudson Yards.

The three-tower scheme chosen from the set of alternative proposals that was released in February calls for a 1,189-foot hotel with 1,750 rooms to be placed at the northernmost edge of the site opposite a 1,366-foot office building and across a plaza area from the x-shape third residential tower, which stands at 1,172-feet will include 1,507 units. A 5.6-acre park will complete the master plan, along with a 750-seat public school and 12,250 square feet of ground-level retail.

Rendering courtesy of Related Companies and Wynn Resorts

Included in this proposal are plans for a gaming component that could potentially earn one of three coveted casino licenses up-for-grabs in the Downstate region (which includes New York City) for $500 million apiece in 2025...

Google NYC's new adaptive-reuse HQ design by Gensler and COOKFOX opens at Hudson Square

2024-02-27T12:52:00-05:00

Google’s brand new New York City headquarters inside St. John’s Terminal at Hudson Square has opened following the completion of a five-year and $2.1 billion project designed by COOKFOX Architects and Gensler.

The renovation of the two-block-long former rail terminus yields a total of 1.3 million square feet of new offices. Another nine stories were added above the existing structure. The building will house some 3,000 employees of the tech giant, who said in a blog post that its design is responsive to a research-driven office strategy and supports a new workplace model that’s meant to foster greater collaboration, creativity, and growth.

Image: courtesy of Google

After restoring the original three floors remaining from its peak usage in the 1930s, the design team created a welcoming space defined by an exterior cut facade detailed on its northern side with reused rail beds that had been leftovers and are kept semi-exposed to create a visible linkage between past and present.

Image...

Plans revealed for Hudson Yards Phase Two with several towers and a potential casino

2024-02-26T12:03:00-05:00

The next chapter in New York’s Hudson Yards has been revealed, with developers filing a bid for a potential mixed-use casino complex. Related Companies and Wynn Resorts submitted plans as part of an environmental impact process last week with the New York City Department of City Planning, which includes two scenarios for the plot directly west of The Vessel.

The proposed site is currently occupied by the West Side Yard and would see the Hudson Yards development expand west, separated from the Hudson River only by 12th Avenue. The plot would also be wrapped on three sides by the High Line, which already borders the south side of the existing Hudson Yards development.

In 2020, Related Companies offered an indicative insight into the architectural intent for the site when it published renderings to assuage concerns that a 700-foot wall would separate the development from The High Line.

Hudson Yards Phase Two proposed plan. Massing and plan credit: Related/NYC Planning

Both scenarios sub...

BIG completes award-winning The Spiral tower in Manhattan

2023-10-25T19:57:00-04:00

BIG has shared photos to follow the firm’s completion of the new 2.8 million-square-foot The Spiral office tower in Midtown Manhattan.

Located at the entrance to the High Line Park on 34th Street between 10th Avenue and Hudson Boulevard, the 66-story structure rises to a total height of 1,031.5 feet and offers the neighborhood skyline a distinctive new visual identity taken from its stepped silhouette and a ribbon of outdoor terraces that cascade down the setback facade to a street level podium.

Photo © Laurian Ghinitoiu

The design team, which also included Adamson Associates, made wind- and drought-resistant biophilic elements a central part of the building’s exterior, working to unprecedented new heights for commercial high-rises. Certain plant species were selected for their ability to flower as early as February, in combination with evergreen ivy varieties. The program also creates flexible workspaces and includes an exclusive clubhouse on the uppermos...

Go inside The Shed’s short-lived Sonic Sphere installation with The New York Times

2023-07-06T17:26:00-04:00

“It’s about a change in consciousness that leaves a memory,” [Ed] Cooke said of the project. “Can people have an experience where they touch some new territory of consciousness, not in a way that is like an altered state, but one that actually leaves a trace?”

The 50-ton space, which is suspended some 34 feet above the ground, has a capacity of 250 people and was promoted by co-designer Merijn Royaards as a “sensory laboratory that [...] bends time, expands consciousness, and punctures our perception of reality” at the project’s announcement in early May.

Video courtesy of The Shed/YouTube

Its design was supposedly inspired by German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen’s Kugelauditorium from 1970 and includes a JBL sound system for special 45-minute ticketed performances. The venue closes on July 30th, with a return to New York planned for next year. Speaking of their intent for the $2 million project, Royaards' colleague Ed Cooke told the Times, “We want to give [people] something magical.”

The Shed debuts Sonic Sphere suspended musical feature

2023-05-09T13:17:00-04:00

The Shed at New York City’s Hudson Yards has unveiled plans for a new, temporary 65-foot spherical concert hall feature to be placed inside the arts venue’s McCourt performance space this summer.

The space is the product of architectural designers Ed Cooke, Merijn Royaards, and Nicholas Christie and has previously been enacted at the 2022 Burning Man festival and ten other venues.

Lounge-type seating is combined with a listening platform that's suspended 34 feet off the ground. Standing sections and a netted center complete the spatial design, with a capacity for 250 persons, a JBL sound system, and lighting design from Polina Zakh. The space was supposedly inspired by Karlheinz Stockhausen’s 1970 Kugelauditorium for the World Expo in Japan that same year.

Royaards explains: “My first experience of clubbing was during a cold winter in early ’90s Rotterdam. The interference patterns of visual, sonic, and kinetic waveform transmissions that flooded the dance floor and enveloped me we...

Foster + Partners' 50 Hudson Yards officially opens in New York City

2022-10-25T21:05:00-04:00

Foster + Partners’ 50 Hudson Yards, a 78-story, mixed-use office tower in New York City has officially opened.

The nearly three million-square-foot and LEED Gold-designed structure occupies an entire block and features flexible office space, retail facilities, and public spaces. It also offers restaurants, bike parking, and transport connections, which is in the form of an underground connection to the adjacent subway station. Work on the latest addition to Hudson Yards began in 2016.

“Our project is a response to the site within Hudson Yards, but its geometry also respects the wider context of the New York street grid,” said Foster + Partners founder Norman Foster. “ The innovative elevator strategy and unique space planning provide prime users of the tower with their own lobbies, exclusive access, and separate identities. Column-free floor plates and generous ceiling heights provide high-quality workspaces with maximum flexibility for change in the future. A purpose-built tunnel c...

Some of NYC’s biggest high-rollers want a casino in Coney Island, but local residents aren’t buying in

2022-08-04T10:00:00-04:00

If real estate developers get their way, Coney Island may soon be losing its seasonal vibe. The New York Post is reporting that several of the city's leading corporate entities, including Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross' Related Companies, Vornado, and S.L. Green, have expressed interest in two of the state's three new available casino licenses as part of an expansion endorsed by Governor Kathy Hochul.

Looking to Atlantic City as a model, Thor Equities owner Joe Sitt is pitching a gaming destination in his native Coney Island as a potential commercial booster. Hudson Yards, Times Square, and Queens’ Willets Point neighborhood have also been floated. In total, the projects could bring in at least $1.5 billion in license revenue for the state. The year-round operation of the casinos could engender even greater profits dependent on an agreed-upon tax rate between the state and potential developers.

Other than money, the subway system seems to be the main determining factor in the m...

The project's ‘architect’ says he had no active role in Hudson Yards tower design

2022-06-13T13:48:00-04:00

But Mr. Schiffman said he had no active role in those projects, a statement that raises questions about whether the buildings were approved for construction without the oversight and involvement of a registered architect — a requirement in New York State to ensure that buildings are properly designed and do not pose a safety risk.

The New York Times has obtained a document showing that the credentials of a retired architect in his mid-80s were used to fake his approval of building designs that he did not review. Warren L. Schiffman has been designated as the architect of record on an under-construction, 642-feet-tall hotel rising in Hudson Yards, along with a hotel near LaGuardia Airport and dual high-rise residences in Queens. Each of these projects fall under developer Marx Development Group.

The document shows a contract Schiffman signed upon his retirement from Marx Development Group in 2016 that details how the company’s design firm, DSM Design Group, could continue to use his seal of approval following his absence. Signed shortly before Marx Development Group embarked on the three aforementioned projects, the contract called for Schiffman to provide his architectural stamp and signature to DSM Design Group when requested. However, Schiffman claims he was never asked to review any building plans.

In addi...

Billie Tsien on New York City, student loans, and hating Hudson Yards

2021-10-26T14:26:00-04:00

I would like to remove Hudson Yards. I don’t even know what I would replace it with. I just feel really angry because it’s a part of the city that turns its back to the city. It’s not even the buildings, or size of the buildings — which are humongous — that bother me. It’s that back-turning. I actually have refused to enter it, except when I was walking on the High Line […] it pretends to be a space for everybody when it is not.

Tsien, who broke ground last month on the Obama Presidential Library in Chicago, recently began a four-year term as Chair of the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, which will afford her a direct line to government officials on a number of different topics involving the design community.

"The biggest problem and opportunity facing the profession of architecture is diversity," she told Curbed when asked about the challenges facing the industry today. "And one of the causes is expensive graduate school with not necessarily any payoff in the end. Leaving school $200,000 in debt, and the prospect of a job that might pay $65,000 a year, is daunting to anybody."

See the elevated pedestrian pathway that will connect the High Line to Moynihan Train Hall

2021-09-22T19:08:00-04:00

Governor Kathy Hochul has unveiled designs for an elevated pedestrian pathway that will connect the High Line to the recently opened Moynihan Train Hall. The $50 million project will also connect Chelsea with other West Side destinations like Hudson Yards, Manhattan West, Penn Station, and the Javits Center. The pathway is expected to be completed by Spring 2023.

Rendering courtesy of the Governor's Office

The Vessel at Hudson Yards is reopening after a string of suicides

2021-05-27T21:22:00-04:00

Hudson Yards is reopening The Vessel this week with a renewed focus on suicide prevention following a rash of incidents last year.

The Vessel was closed in January after three people took their lives inside the 150-foot sculpture over a period of 15 months.

Harm-reduction trainings have been added along with a number of other security precautions including a ban on solo entry, signs promoting suicide prevention, and added staff, which developer Related Companies says will be funded by a new $10 ticket fee.

Previously on Archinect: Hudson Yards Vessel closed following another suicide

Related Companies did not offer to raise the waist-high barriers that line the walkway inside of Thomas Heatherwick’s centerpiece sculpture. The move would have mirrored similar prevention measures taken recently at NYU and the George Washington bridge with some success, according to the New York Times.

“I understand that the Vessel is seen as a work of art and architecture, and there’s a certain aestheti...

Massive NYC development grinds to a halt

2021-02-08T16:38:00-05:00

Even more perilous, the promised second phase of Hudson Yards — eight additional buildings, including a school, more luxury condos and office space — appears on indefinite hold as the developer, the Related Companies, seeks federal financing for a nearly 10-acre platform on which it will be built. Related, which had said the entire project would be finished in 2024, no longer offers an estimated completion date.

The New York Times is reporting on the uncertain future of the $25 billion Hudson Yards mega-development in Manhattan’s Far West Side.

The starchitect-studded development is reeling from ongoing effects of the global Covid-19 pandemic, as luxury condos remain unsold and commercial tenants go under. Additionally, tourist attractions remain closed and the development's centerpiece—Heatherwick Studio's Vessel—has been closed following its third suicide in less than a year.

The situation enveloping Hudson Yards is representative of the state of speculative real estate across the country, though the Manhattan project is perhaps the nation's largest single site. Developers, architects and the entire real estate vertical are rethinking the needs of cities in which dramatically more people are working from home, demand for office space is shrinking, and delivery services are bringing more food and products directly to our doorsteps.

Hudson Yards Vessel closed following another suicide

2021-01-13T13:04:00-05:00

The Vessel, the spiraling staircase at Hudson Yards on Manhattan’s Far West Side, was closed to visitors on Tuesday, a day after a 21-year-old man jumped to his death in the third suicide in less than a year. It was unclear when the 150-foot structure, the vast development’s centerpiece, would reopen to the public.

According to the NYT, the Vessel sculpture at Hudson Yards, which opened in March 2019, will remain closed "until further notice."

Over 1,100 foot-high observation deck to open in Hudson Yards, will be highest in Western Hemisphere

2020-03-10T11:46:00-04:00

The KPF-designed 30 Hudson Yards has long been deemed the tallest building of the Hudson Yards development, and due to open this month is the anticipated observation deck Edge, which, floating right at 1,131 feet high, will be the tallest observation deck in the Western Hemisphere. Located on the 100th floor of 30 Hudson Yards, it will take visitors a 52 second elevator ride to reach the platform's 7,500 square foot viewing area.

Nine-foot tall glass walls of angled glass allow viewers to "lean out over Manhattan." The sky deck also includes a glass floor to further exaggerate the intensity of the observation experience as the deck extends almost 80 feet from the face of the tower.

See the views from NYC’s highest outdoor residential space at 15 Hudson Yards

2020-02-19T19:18:00-05:00

Adding to Hudson Yards’ height superlatives, the city’s highest outdoor residential amenity space has opened at 15 Hudson Yards. Rising 900 feet in the air, “Skytop” features 6,000 square feet of curvy indoor-outdoor space, which follows the shape of the building’s crown. Designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro with interiors by Rockwell Group, the amenity space offers unobstructed views of the Hudson River and beyond.

Image by Scott Frances for Related-Oxford

19-year-old jumps to his death from the Vessel in Hudson Yards

2020-02-03T00:27:00-05:00

Police officers on the scene Saturday night asked visitors climbing on the 154 interconnecting staircases to leave the structure. It closed 30 minutes before its usual 7 p.m. shutdown. On Sunday, the site reopened to the public.

Hudson Yards now has its own video game starring comedian Conner O'Malley

2020-01-30T08:41:00-05:00

Hudson Yards has received its share of mockery. Be it Archinect's April Fools' day joke, Vessel's Shawarma like appearance or the Luxury Real Estate Dildo Experience, there has been a fair share of criticism and poking fun of the new development.

Well now, there is a Hudson Yards "video game," and it stars comedian Conner O'Malley. Check it out below!

Hudson Yards repackages rendering to assuage park wall worries

2020-01-15T14:57:00-05:00

Following reports that plans for the western Hudson Yards site would include a massive 700-foot-long wall separating the development from the High Line, Related Companies, the developer behind the $25 billion mega-development, has published a rendering in an attempt to contradict those previous reports.

(3/4) Our plan has always been to build an open space along the lines of this years-old rendering and we are working to manage the technical challenges to achieve this. There has never been a wall along the High Line and there will never be a wall. pic.twitter.com/KNy9mBEJml
— Hudson Yards NYC (@_HudsonYardsNYC) January 15, 2020

Writing via official Hudson Yards Twitter account, project backers state: "We have always shared the vision that the Western Yard should include a great public open space. We don’t yet have a final design but have always understood clearly that our open space needs to work well with the High Line and the Hudson River."

View of the previously released designs...

700-foot wall could turn Hudson Yards into a real gated community

2020-01-10T16:28:00-05:00

Writing in The New York Times, architecture critic Michael Kimmelman sounds off against recently revealed intentions by Related Companies, the developer of Hudson Yards, that could wall off a semi-public park slated for the western end of the mega-project's second phase site.

The plan for the so-called Western Yard development was originally approved containing a green space that dipped down to meet the city's Hudson River edge, but is now potentially being changed to create a "man-made promontory" that could limit visual connections between the High Line and the park, potentially cementing the district's already strong reputation for existing as a "quasi-gated community" in the heart of Manhattan.

Describing rumors of the changing design, Kimmelman writes, "The developer has recently been talking about elevating the yard’s deck several stories to fit a parking garage underneath," adding, "the site would no longer decline toward the river but rise up, as it moved east to west, cre...

New York real estate stories in 2019

2019-12-30T21:35:00-05:00

There were highs and lows for New York real estate this year. Sales records were broken, but the overall market hit the brakes, even as mortgage rates stayed low. Design took center stage in many new developments, and Hudson Yards opened to great fanfare.

The New York Times takes a look back at the 2019 real estate highlights in the nation's biggest city. The roundup features a number of property stories that were also published (and some hotly debated) on Archinect, including the recently opened, Robert A.M. Stern-designed 220 Central Park South with its record-setting $238 million penthouse sale in January, rapid-fire completions and topping-outs this year at the Hudson Yards development (did someone say Vessel?), and the steadily slowing condo sales despite record-breaking residential construction in New York City.

If the astronomical NYC property price tags leave you dizzy and unbalanced, revisit the pre-Christmas announcement of Mayor de Blasio pledging to end 'street homelessness as we know it' within five years.

The Vessel will become accessible with an ADA-compliant platform and lift

2019-12-23T13:54:00-05:00

Representatives of the United States Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York and the United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division announced today that Related Companies and ERY Vessel LLC have agreed to install a new accessibility platform at the Vessel in Hudson Yards as part of a legal agreement aimed at bringing American with Disabilities Act (ADA) compliance to the eight-story outdoor sculpture.

The agreement dictates that Related and ERY will design, construct, install, and operate a "one of a kind platform lift mechanism on the upper levels of the Heatherwick Studio-designed Vessel ... to increase the Vessel’s accessibility for individuals with disabilities," according to a United States Justice Department announcement. The platform will ensure that people with disabilities can move around the upper level perimeter of the Vessel in order to enjoy the Vessel's 360-degree views over Hudson Yards, the Hudson River, and New Jersey.

According to the m...

Sex toy architecture? "XXX-HY: A Luxury Real Estate Dildo Experience"

2019-10-04T11:45:00-04:00

Architecture practice Wolfgang & Hite has designed architectural sex toys reimagine each of the new buildings at the Hudson Yards. “There’s a lot to love in NYC’s recent building boom, but the city and developers have been jerking each other off for decades, so naturally we wanted to join in the fun… Masturbation is a great metaphor for the latest wave of development in New York City," writes the group on their website.

The collection has been named XXX-HY: A Luxury Real Estate Dildo Experience. Each piece has been scaled to 1"= 100' and includes Heatherwick Studio's Vessel as an "amateur buttplug," DSR's Shed as a clitoral stimulator, and KPF's "gargantuan roof deck tower as a magnum fisting dildo - recommended for those without a fear of heights." Also in the bunch is SOM's "super-slender" 25 Hudson Yards.

"Sex does the body good. After the fiery criticisms of Hudson Yards this year, we thought city officials might need a healthy outlet for working through some of that guilt," wr...

Cultural offerings at The Shed dry up as fashion week, artists avoid the venue due to developer's Trump donations

2019-09-05T14:30:00-04:00

Hudson Yards’ nonprofit arts center, The Shed, has been shunned by the fashion elite since developer Stephen Ross’ Trump ties were exposed in early August. Sources say that Michael Kors, Vera Wang and the Academy of Art University were all slated to show their collections at the sleek, $475 million venue but have pulled out. Rag & Bone publicly nixed the space, which opened in April, right after news broke of Ross’ Aug. 9 Trump fundraiser in the Hamptons.

Fern Mallis, the mogul who created New York Fashion Week in the 1990s, told The New York Post that The Shed is “kind of over,” adding, “If you know people showing at The Shed, please tell me because I don’t know who is."

The fallout comes after news broke in August that Stephen Ross, one of the developers behind the Hudson Yards development, was hosting a $250,000-a-seat fundraiser for President Donald Trump. The news was met with boycotts of many Ross-affiliated business enterprises.

Undulating glass tower with canted, gridded facades coming to Hudson Yards site

2019-08-23T14:30:00-04:00

Architects DSM Design Group and Marx Development Group have unveiled renderings for an undulating glass tower slated for New York City's Hudson Yards.

The 487-foot tower design differs markedly from previous iterations of the project, which displayed more conventional and monolithic glass skin designs. The latest version of the tower, according to a rendering published by New York YIMBY, features a skinny, undulating body wrapped in canted gridded glass facades. Stacked in two-floor modules, the cuboid tower appears to move as it rises, reflecting the sky and its surroundings in slightly oblique compositions. The lower levels of the building contain a series of protruding double- and triple-height volumes .

New York YIMBY reports that excavation for the project's foundations are well underway and that the structure will eventually contain a 531-room hotel. Additionally, the site reports that the project is due to be completed in the fall of 2022.

Reflecting on Joseph Giovannini's review of "The Shed" three months after its opening

2019-07-31T10:33:00-04:00

Roughly three months after the opening of Diller Scofidio + Renfro and the Rockwell Group's cultural venue at Hudson Yards, several media publications and critics have voiced their opinions about The Shed. Having received a variety of reviews, some have shown interest and praise of the space while others have addressed the Shed's connectivity to corporate greed, false philanthropy, and inclusion. Despite it all Manhattan's newest cultural hub still stands, hosting performances and other events since its grand opening, as intended. However, a review made by famed architectural critic Joseph Giovannini back in April casts The Shed in a different light.

A prominent figure in architectural writing and criticism, Giovannini has reviewed and shared his thoughts on several projects over the years, including Zumthor's LACMA design, Zaha's Port House, and Ghery's Louis Vuitton Foundation. Pulling from his own experience in professional practice and writing, Giov...

Hudson Yards and Stern-designed towers dominate NYC's ultraluxury real estate sales

2019-06-11T14:03:00-04:00

Manhattan’s latest crop of new luxury developments continues to attract a steady stream of buyers. At the ultra-pricey 220 Central Park South in Midtown, the grand limestone skyscraper designed by Robert A.M. Stern Architects, four more units officially sold, including New York City’s most expensive closing in May: a three-bedroom aerie for nearly $26.5 million.

The NYT's Vivian Marino provides an update on the biggest recent luxury real estate transactions in New York City with notably pricey purchases at Robert A.M. Stern's 220 Central Park South and 250 West 81st Street towers and also at the newly opened Hudson Yards mammoth development.

"Philip I. Kent, the former chief executive of Turner Broadcasting System, was one of the many buyers at 15 Hudson Yards, the megaproject’s first residential tower. (Oh, and the architect who helped design that building also bought an apartment — in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.)," writes Marino.

Roppongi Hills: The Tokyo neighborhood that provided inspiration for Hudson Yards

2019-04-08T12:20:00-04:00

Hudson Yards may appear to be a made-in-NYC development, but in actual fact, it took its blueprint from a similar neighborhood in Tokyo known as Roppongi Hills, which broke ground in the 1990s and opened in 2003. While there are a few notable differences—you won’t find any rice paddies on the roofs of Hudson Yards’ buildings, for one—the similarities are striking. But in many respects, this is no surprise—architectural firm KPF played a hand in the design of both developments.

See inside Hudson Yards arts center The Shed ahead of Friday’s opening

2019-04-03T16:16:00-04:00

A new cultural institution in New York City opens on Friday after more than a decade in the making. The Shed, which straddles the recently opened Hudson Yards neighborhood and the High Line on 30th Street, will commission and present original artwork across a variety of disciplines.

View from the High Line; Photo by Iwan Baan, courtesy of The Shed

Designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Rockwell Group, the building features a 120-foot movable shell, allowing it to physically change on demand and adapt to different performances. Kicking things off April 5 is a five-night concert series, “Soundtrack of America,” which was directed by Steve McQueen, Quincy Jones, and Maureen Mahon, and explores the impact of African American music on modern culture.

View of The Shed from 30th Street; Photo by Iwan Baan, courtesy of The Shed

The Shed consists of two floors of column-free galleries, 500-seat Griffin Theater (named for billionaire Ken Griffin who donated $25 million for the project), and the...