Commenting on this article 5 years after it was published makes the comments written at the time even more poignant. As the years continue to pass, all sites, no matter how large, small or complex "scream out" to br redeveloped as highest end condos. Period. it is clear that there is fundamentally no housing being built of the working or middle class, making it even clearer that housing in the city of New York will ultimately be accessible only to the wealty. An utterly bleak and bland future for the melting pot it once was.
Oh wow-- gorgeous renderings!
Just what NYC needs: more exorbitantly-price luxury apartments.
Do SO&M and other well-known architecture firms have ethical standards as they accept new projects/clients? Do they care at all about the actual needs of the cities in which they design buildings -- and the majority of the people who live in them?
Does it not matter to them that buildings they design, such as this one, use a tremendous amount of space and other resources in order to serve a relatively very small number of people, many of whom likely already have one or more other luxury properties in which to reside? Do they not care that, likely, a good portion of the building they designed will remain uninhabited for significant portions of the year when owners or renters are at one of their other (more permanent?) homes; while at the same time many, many people whose only home is in NYC, are having to pay at least 1/2 or 2/3
of their income for rent -- if they can find a place in the City to reside at all.
The big architecture firms have a role to play in addressing housing shortages (as in housing that middle- and lower-income people and families can afford). They have the opportunity to show the power of architecture not just in aesthetic or functional terms, but also in moral and ethical terms. The question is, do they care enough about communities in which they design and build, and about the soul and legacy of architecture and their names?
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The building is largely finished on the outside, perhaps the NY Times can publish some actual photos and not renderings of a fantasy look.
Also, the old building was removed quickly and the new one built very quickly, suggesting less good workmanship.
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One ugly building. It appears to pay homage only to one former upper west side development -- the Trump buildings off Riverside Drive. Caveat emptor.
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"It was such an amazing site it screamed out to be a condo development,” said Martin Piazzola, senior vice president" For who? Screamed the out priced renter. "That haunted us" said Chris Cooper". Will it haunt him that this is another building for the 1% and that this building is not affordable for locals.
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@New Yorker, the locals are the 1%. The Lincoln Square neighborhood is one of the most expensive locales on the planet. It would be very odd if local market rate new construction were not targeting the wealthy.
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While I'm sure I've walked past it countless times a picture of the original building would have been a helpful inclusion to the article.
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@C. Fig
There is a photo of it in the article.
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If only all the brutalist buildings from the 60s could be demolished and replaced.
3
I live in smaller town (30,000+) in northwest Georgia, where $200,000 is considered quite upscale for a family home. My own 1200-sq ft brick home from the late 1950s, which I absolutely love, would not even fetch $90,000 on a good day.
But I do love reading about architecture and seeing these amazing new buildings going up in New York. Zaha Hadid's new building on the High Line is a masterpiece, in my view.
Still, I must ask: how does anyone afford these units? Not just the extraordinary price tags but the monthly access fees, taxes, etc.? Obviously New York City demands teachers and policemen and firefighters and sanitation workers -- where do all these folks live?
Aesthetically, it's fascinating to see all of these new developments. But with starting price tags in the seven figures, it's just a mystery to me how anyone except the truly global elite can afford anything at all.
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@sdcga161 Everyone living in America is part of the "global elite". You, living in a 1200sf home in Georgia, are doing better than the vast majority of the people on Earth. It's all relative. This article is about brand new condos in a prime location in one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the world. Of course the prices will be out of the price range of most average people, but there are plenty of housing options in NYC that are more reasonably-priced.
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@Heather N,
It seems every place that is nice is being over-run by the wealthy and their insatiable appetite for more and ever more luxurious homes. As a former resident of Vancouver I have to say that the city has been very seriously compromised if not ruined by international property investment. No more bookstores, nothing but chain retail, let alone any affordable housing. Now Vancouver's mega-bubble has spread to my town where I am currently looking to buy something. A tiny tear-down house is at least 700 thousand dollars. About ten times my income. Anything I can barely afford, even a 550 square foot condo, is a 40 or 50 year old dump. There are absolutely no "other options" that are anywhere near my price range, NONE.
NYC is obviously a global city and there is a market for top-end real estate. But I doubt anyone except the super rich - who now take ALL economic gains exclusively for themselves - is happy about the housing situation overall.
Enough with globalization already.
I would have liked to have been able to own a house, like pretty much anyone with one job could have in the recent past (sdcga 161's house in Georgia sounds like a fairy tale to me) but that will never happen now.
Enough is enough, it's well past time to heavily tax the global rich so that they are stopped from ruining cities for the people who work there.
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Yet another glass building for the super-rich, helping to make 10023 one of the wealthiest zip codes in the City.
At 32 stories, it will tower over Lincoln Center because no one thought to zone for perimeter buildings when it was built.
Broadway from 60th to 66th, and probably to 72nd, is one of the most boring and pedestrian-scarce parts of the entire 12 mile street.
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@akamai:
the are plenty of pedestrians between 72nd and Lincoln Center.
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@akamai
You said it.
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