Photographer Colin Miller has new images of the Thomas Heatherwick-designed Lantern House condominium building sitting along the High Line in New York’s tony Chelsea neighborhood.
The recently completed development was a bit overshadowed by Heatherwick Studio’s recent additions to the city, which includes the controversial Vessel at Hudson Yards and nearby Little Island floating park.
Now, as tenants officially begin moving into the designer’s first completed residential development, admire the sculptural form and unique modular bay window facade thanks to Miller‘s photos of the latest high-profile Heatherwick addition to the visual landscape of New York City.
41 Comments
For God's sake, turn off the AC and open a few windows. She's gonna blow!
We can't hold this pressure much longer cap'n!
i'd be embarrassed to put this in my portfolio; certainly feels like a regrettable second-year gimmick.
A design better suited to the headquarters of a brewery.
The price of success: the magificent High Line is shadowed (literally) by a double wall of superlux condos in some of the worst architecture imaginable, each new one worse than the last.
It's the corners I don't like. That's what makes it look like barrels. If he had just terminate the corners more traditionally and kept the window scheme all the way to the edge.... it would look a lot less cheesy. Though... I don't hate it as a whole.
I think it is striking, with the exception of that glass handrail. And the interior window shades.
The development, urban planning, social, and economic implications of the project are another issue entirely.
striking? it's a one trick (nonfunctional) pony. would have looked and operated much better without the bulbous windows.
I'm just sick to death of buildings as objects. The entire point of this building is living behind those bay windows - where is the photograph from inside?
Aside from how hideous the design is, how are residents going to install and operate window shades?
Comical
It appears to be an immersive environment of contained rage.
Not the first time a starchitect has blundered into the darker aspects of the human condition.
pretty strong opinions about what's really a very normal building with odd windows.
idk, its nice. not a masterpiece, and thats fine. its a normal building executed with wit and cleverness. kind of humorously contextual, a caricature of the city. maybe thats why people here hate it - its making fun of what we do.
Where the Highline was initially a lovely park largely open to air and rooftops it is now scrutinized by walls of humongous glass eyeballs. Imagine walking through the valley created by this building.
This is a near-perfect metaphor for the security state and stratified culture where elites literally look down on the masses.
Which is no surprise as it was designed by the rich for the rich to sell to the rich.
Who is looking whom? I hate these two words, I always use them incorrectly.
Compared to some of the garbage on The High Line, this is sublime. Would I like some interior shots, sure. But I actually love bulbous, fishbowl windows, and the fish that live inside, with their 1-800-USA-BLIND, is actually kind of funny. I mean, why buy this, in the most public of parks, if you're going to go with white horizontal blinds.
Also, look at these two details from two buildings along the High Line, and tell me which one is more considered;
i'll give you that; it is pretty funny watching a bunch of rich people in an aquarium try to figure out how to put blinds on these "windows"
I'm entertained by the fact that these dupes bought these things, and can't use their windows. Perfect.
Does anyone recognize the last photo?
Given the bronze (faux-bronze?) I'm guessing its the ZHA project but I don't specifically recognize it.
@beta you ever confirm?
@nam, oh, I know the building, I took the photo. I was curious if anyone else could.
I'm actually in the camp of not hating this building and maybe actually liking it. I might have left the windows in the field of the facade flat rather than bulbous (proportionally they are too skinny for me), but I think the curved brick and the bulbous windows at the corners are actually kind of nice formally.
I agree that some interior shots would be nice to see how the interior of the windows is resolved.
As for the comments about it being a one-trick pony ... I think I'm ok with that. I'd rather have a pony that does one trick well than having a pony that tries to do all the tricks and fails.
Generally agree here. I like big frame buildings that express the structure, then do interesting things inside the bays. Even (some of) the bulbous bay windows look fine to me.
The big mistake IMO is the choice of one motif and repeating it endlessly, only modifying it at corners and ground floor. If it was a small-ish block, fine; but its apparent size and complexity of massing needs more variation. Four or five conditions (concave? sliding behind a column for a two-bay version? flush? flat recessed? I don't know...) would strengthen the concept and relieve it of its oddly complicated monotony overall.
I agree in theory, but would withhold judgement on any proposed option until seeing it ... but I'd like to explore the options if I were doing the project.
You make a good point about the repeated motif resulting in monotony.
I do my best work in theory!
i don't mind everything but the bubble windows, and they are by far the most dominant element- without them it would be a far better building. could never imagine desiring fishbowl windows instead of the regular rectilinear ones; guess i'm old fashioned.
That's fair. I'm not saying everyone has to like it. I'm not even saying I necessarily like it. I just don't hate it. There are parts of it that make me feel uneasy. The last photo in the article is probably the worst offender and I think it has to do with the proportions of the windows while being bulbous. I think they'd be fine if flat rather than bulbous. IMO, the corner windows are better proportionally and that's probably because they "feel" more settled to me most likely because they evoke a barrel ... something that is common enough that people are used to it and maybe feel like it has a natural proportionality. I'd also critique it that it looks too much like a barrel and maybe should be abstracted better [shrug].
Overall, I'd give it a B- and ask for more iterations of the concept.
Heatherwick shouldve been over after the stupid VESSEL.
Some of Heatherick's building scale work have a really weird tendency to look like they are trying very hard to imitatet something, usually nature - the visual metaphor works at an overall scale but gets clunky at a smaller scale. The details are ironically fine for the most part, from the outside, but some of the formal transitions - which might have seemed elegant as a sketch - manifest as clumsy masses of material at eye level. The canopy that drapes below the High Line is one such example. Little Island too displays this circus-like trait - reminds me of those fake buildings in Disneyland that have all the trappings of a real building (and even functioning interiors) but just feel fake.
There are some nice moves but what's with the constant repetition of a motif. Why can't there be more articulation to enliven the design. Bay windows are cool, but this looks like a glass barrel warehouse. In fairness, repetition is the curse of modern architecture.
It looks like the buyers get a curtain track to place floor to ceiling draperies a foot or so in from the bay window.
The lack of operable windows is weird considering how much the window openings are divided up.
Seemed like the simplest answer, and I was wondering why people were worrying so much about it. Draperies along the High Line aren't without precedent either.
Agreed. I would've just gone for doubly curved slump formed glass for the entire corner if you weren't going to make the lites operable.
Lack of operable windows is a miss. Could have also introduced a sense of randomness to the monotony as some are opened, others closed, etc.
The whole thing is an "statement" facade wrapper applied over a stack of boring box condo units. The apartment floor plans are very run of the mill.
https://www.lanternhouse.com/f...
aka, gimmick.
Is that good or bad? Everytime someone does not-boring non-orthagonal unit layouts they get utterly skewered here also.
Yup, the whole thing is a facade job. Never thought Heatherwick could do good residential design anyways...
It bothers me that the majority of the lanterns are two floors high, yet they are cut in half by the floor plate and filled in with a band of spandrel glass. I wish there had been duplex units with double height living rooms behind the big lantern windows. Some balconies would have helped relive the monotony of the facade also.
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