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New York City: The Latest Architecture and News

The BIG U: BIG's New York City Vision for "Rebuild by Design"

Yesterday BIG, along with 9 other teams including OMA and WXY, unveiled their proposals for "Rebuild by Design," a competition which tasks teams with improving the resiliency of waterfront communities through locally-responsive, innovative design. Each proposal was required to be "flexible, easily phased, and able to integrate with existing projects in progress." As Henk Ovink, the Principal of "Rebuild by Design" as well as the Senior Advisor to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Shaun Donovan, stated: "Rebuild by Design is not about making a plan, but about changing a culture." The winners will be announced later this spring.

BIG's proposal, The BIG U, is rooted in the firm's signature concepts of social infrastructure and hedonistic sustainability. It envisions a 10-mile protective system that encircles Manhattan, protecting the city from floods and storm water while simultaneously providing public realms specific to the needs of the city's diverse communities. Bjarke Ingels states: "We asked ourselves: What if we could envision the resilience infrastructure for Lower Manhattan in a way that wouldn’t be like a wall between the city and the water, but rather a string of pearls of social and environmental amenities tailored to their specific neighborhoods, that also happens to shield their various communities from flooding. Social infrastructure understood as a big overall strategy rooted in the local communities.”

More on the BIG U, after the break...

Emerging Architects Austin+Mergold Win Folly 2014

Socrates Sculpture Park and The Architectural League of New York have announced that Austin+Mergold have won “Folly 2014” – an annual competition among emerging architects to design and build a large-scale project for public exhibition at Socrates Sculpture Park in Long Island City – with their project SuralArk, an installation that is "part ship, part house."

The annual “Folly” program strives to give emerging architects and designers the opportunity to build public projects that explore the boundaries between architecture and sculpture. This year's proposal beat out 171 submissions from 17 countries; it was selected by a jury made up of Chris Doyle, Artist; John Hatfield, Socrates Sculpture Park; Enrique Norten, TEN Arquitectos; Lisa Switkin, James Corner Field Operations; and Ada Tolla, LOT-EK.

SuralArk will open on May 11th through August 3rd. Learn more about the project after the break.

Robert A.M. Stern Tops NYC Tower with $100 Million Penthouse

Robert A.M. Stern’s luxury 520 Park Avenue condominium tower, which is set to take its place on Manhattan skyline by 2017, will be topped with a 12,400 square foot triplex priced at $100 million - the city’s priciest unit. The penthouse will be one of 31 expansive residences offered in the limestone-clad building which, according to the a recent press release, will be “evocative of the great New York apartment buildings of the 1920's and 1930's.” Developers William and Arthur Zeckendorf gained approval for the 51-story skyscraper by purchasing $30.4 million in air rights from the neighboring Christ Church.

Construction Begins on the Vast Platform for New York's Hudson Yards

The construction of Hudson Yards, the biggest private real estate development in the history of the United States and currently the largest development in New York City since the Rockefeller Center, is gaining momentum. The vast infrastructural project in the heart of the city is set to enclose an active rail yard with an expansive platform, paving the way for 28 acres (and 17 million square feet) of commercial and residential space. Housing over 100 commercial units, 5000 residences, 14 acres of open public space, an enormous school and luxury hotel all on top of a working train depot, the project will directly connect to a new subway station and meet with the High Line.

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Foster + Partners' New York Public Library Redesign in State of Limbo

Foster + Partner's controversial renovation plans for the New York Public Library (NYPL) are currently in a state of limbo while the city decides their course of action. Foster's proposal for the 20th century Carrère and Hastings "masterpiece" on 5th Avenue is a response to the cultural shift from traditional stacks to online resources, as the library has experienced a 41% decrease in the use of collections over the last 15 years.

Calatrava's World Trade Center Transit Hub Fails to Impress

“How can a $3.94 billion building be made to look cheap?” A small part of Santiago Calatrava’s World Trade Center Transportation Hub has been opened to the public, and the critics aren’t impressed. According to the New York Times’ article by David Dunlap, the buildings "chunky fixtures" and "rough workmanship" "detract from what is meant to be breathtaking grandeur." Read more, here.

Tadao Ando to Design First New York City Building

Tadao Ando has been commissioned to design his first New York City building. Though little information has been released, the residential development firm Sumaida + Khurana has closed a deal with the Japanese architect to design a 32,000 square foot, eight-unit, luxury condominium building at 152 Elizabeth Street in Nolita. Construction is expected to begin later this year and the building will be completed in 2016.

TIME Debuts Powerful, Multimedia Story on One World Trade

Today, TIME unveiled "Top of America," a multimedia site relaying the gripping story of One World Trade, the David Childs-designed skyscraper that stands 1,776-feet tall within Daniel Libeskind's masterplan. Beyond providing interesting tidbits of information (did you know that both an 18th century boat and an ice-age formation were found while digging out the building's foundations?), the article, written by Josh Sanburn, is a fascinating and often deeply moving account -- one that gets across the sheer force of will and the extraordinary amount of collaboration it took to raise this building into the atmosphere:

"Nine governors, two mayors, multiple architects, a headstrong developer, thousands of victims’ families and tens of thousands of neighborhood residents fought over this tiny patch of real estate…. Almost 13 years later…. America’s brawny, soaring ­ambition—the drive that sent pioneers west, launched rockets to the moon and led us to build steel-and-glass towers that pierced the clouds—is intact. Reaching 1,776 ft. has ensured it."

TIME's investment into the story was considerable (and, one can speculate, motivated by a desire to rival the fantastic multimedia features of The New York Times). The site is accompanied by a special issue of TIME, a documentary film, an unprecedented 360-degree interactive photograph, and - come April - even a book. Sanburn was not only granted exclusive access to the project for about a year, but photographer Jonathan Woods is the only journalist to have ascended to the skyscraper's top. Woods, start-up Gigapan, and mechanical engineers worked over eight months to design (on AutoCAD no less) a 13-foot long, rotating jib that could sustain a camera in the harsh conditions at the top of the tower’s 408-ft. spire; over 600 images were then digitally stitched together to create the 360-degree interactive photograph (which you can purchase here. A portion of the proceeds go to the National September 11 Memorial & Museum).

You can explore TIME's interactive at TIME.com/wtc . Click after the break to watch some incredible videos from the project & read some particularly moving quotes from Sanburn's article.

A Vision for a Self-Reliant New York

"In an era of incompetent nation states and predatory transnationals, we must ratchet up local self-reliance, and the most logical increment of organisation (and resistance) is the city." This is how Michael Sorkin, writing in Aeon Magazine, explains his hypothetical plan to radically change the landscape of New York City, bringing a green landscape and urban farming into the former concrete jungle.

The plan, called "New York City (Steady) State", produced over six years by Sorkin's Terreform Research Group, is not designed simply for aesthetic pleasure; it's not even an attempt to make the city more sustainable (although sustainability is the key motivation behind the project). The project is in fact a "thought-experiment" to design a version of New York that is completely self reliant, creating its own food, energy and everything else within its own borders.

Read on after the break to find out how New York could achieve self-reliance

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Zoning Exception Will Not Be Made for Studio Gang's Solar Carve

The developers behind Studio Gang's Solar Carve have withdrawn their request for a zoning variance that would have allowed for an increase in the tower's rentable space. The Board of Standards and Appeals rejected the solicited exception, despite the developer's claim that the expensive pilings necessary for the sandy, non-bedrock site adjacent to New York's High Line posed a "financial hardship."

Studio Gang's 213 foot tower was slated for completion in 2015. Although "the bid for additional floor has been dropped from the application," said the project's land use attorney, a hearing for special permitting that will allow for a modified setback is scheduled for March. 

VIDEO: Liz Diller on the High Line, A Mile of Respite in the City that Never Sleeps

Liz Diller, one of the three partners of Diller Scofidio + Renfro, discusses the history of the High Line and the active design decisions which led to its success.

The elevated railroad, which was designed to penetrate city blocks rather than parallel an avenue, saw its last delivery (of frozen turkeys) in 1980. By 1999, a “very strange landscape had formed, with a whole eco system around it,” says Diller. Advocacy for the site’s preservation began with two local residents, and culminated in its reclamation with the multidisciplinary collaboration of city officials and impassioned designers (namely James Corner Field Operations, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, and planting designer Piet Oudolf). "The High Line project couldn’t have happened without the right people, the right time and the right administration."

Skyscrapers Shedding Ice in NYC

As New York begins to thaw after record breaking winter conditions, city dwellers are forced to be on high alert for falling ice. Streets surrounding the 1,776-foot One World Trade Center have been closed following reports of ice shearing from its surface. Some blame the more energy efficient buildings for the deadly occurrence, believing that because the newer structures are able to hold in more heat their exteriors remain colder which aids the formation of ice. Materials and building form can help prevent this phenomena. You can learn more here.

Frank Gehry’s Ground Zero Performing Arts Scheme Abandoned

The recent hire of temporary artistic director David Lan has indicated that plans for Ground Zero’s “world center for the performing arts” is moving forward in New York. The famed London director will work alongside Charcoalblue managing partner Andy Hayles to revise the original Frank Gehry-designed scheme which, according to the center’s president, was prematurely designed. This leaves Gehry’s involvement unclear, as the initial 1000-seat center will be abandoned for a scaled down, three-theater house that ranges from 150 to 550 seats. Competition for funding also remains an obstacle, in light of venues such as Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s 2017 Culture Shed. You can learn more about the center’s update here.

Young Projects Play “Match-Maker” in Times Square

Young Projects will be spending the week playing “Match-Maker” in New York City, as the Brooklyn-based studio has debuted their interactive Valentine’s Day installation in the heart of Times Square. Made in collaboration with fabricator Kammetal, as part of Times Square Alliance’s sixth annual heart design competition, the interactive heart-shaped sculpture is designed to cosmically connect people based on their zodiac signs by arranging curious passerby's at twelve points surrounding the installation.

As Young Projects describes, “Peering through colorful, interwoven periscopes provides glimpses of each viewer's four most ideal astrological mates, offering potentially novel connections between lonely souls or settled lovers.”

The Living Wins P.S.1 with Compostable Brick Tower

The Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1 has selected "Hy-Fi," a “circular tower of organic and reflective bricks” designed by The Living (David Benjamin), as the winner of the 15th annual Young Architects Program (YAP) in New York. An exemplar of the cradle-to-cradle philosophy, the temporary installation will be built entirely from organic material via a new method of bio-design.

Six Firms Named 2014's "New Practices New York"

The American Institute of America’s New York Chapter (AIANY) has selected six young, and “pioneering” firms as the winners of the 2014 New Practices New York portfolio competition. The award is designed “to recognize and promote” emerging practices that are less than a decade old and based within the five boroughs of New York City. As a result, each winner will be featured in an exhibition at the Center for Architecture from October 1, through January 15, 2015.

Without further ado, the 2014 New Practices New York winners are:

The New York City Cantilever: If You Can’t Go Up, Go Out

New York City’s notoriously space-hungry real estate market is converting the cantilever – perhaps made most famous in Frank Lloyd Wright’s floating Fallingwater residence of 1935 – from a mere move of architectural acrobatics to a profit-generating design feature. Driven by a “more is more” mantra, developers and architects are using cantilevers to extend the reach of a building, creating unique vistas and extended floor space in a market in which both are priced at sky-high premiums.

TED Talk: Manhattan's Past, Present and Future

When it comes to global cities, New York City may be one of the most prominent - but it is also relatively young. Just 400 years ago, Manhattan island was mostly covered in forests and marshes. In his talk at TEDx Long Island City, Eric Sanderson discusses the city's radical changes in land use over the past four centuries, and begins to contemplate what the next four might look like. How can we take a city like New York and make it as efficient as the forest it replaced? In a bid to uncover the ideas that might make this possible, he introduces Manhatta 2409 - an online tool which maps/compares the historic and current land use of Manhattan and allows users to propose new uses. Learn more in the video above.