New York City: The Latest Architecture and News

Architects: Fabrica 718 Project Team: Cara Solomon, Minyoung Song, Kim Letven, Michael Brehmer, Natalya Egon, Abigail Coover, and Corey Yurkovich Location: Soho, New York City, NY, USA Architect of Record: Melissa Cicetti, AIA MEP Engineer: D’Antonio Consulting Expediter: JAM Project area: 1,850 sq. ft. Project year: 2010 Photographs: Sean Hemmerle

Kate Orff shares her vision of ‘oyster-tecture’ utilizing oysters as an agent for urban change. Focusing on the New York Harbor, Orff, architect and founding principal of Manhattan based studio SCAPE, demonstrates how we can rethink our landscapes, both the green and blue spaces, linking nature and humanity for mutual benefit.

The awkwardly shaped large site at West Side Highway and 57th Street is about to get a whole lot more attention. Bjarke Ingels and BIG will finally make their architectural debut in North America, with an unusual apartment building design in none other than New York City. The asymmetrical peak almost pyramid in shape is the result of blending the mismatched forms of a typical Manhattan tower podium and a low-rise apartment block European in style.

BIG’s reinvention of the ‘New York apartment building’ somehow is able to check all of the boxes, providing a connection to the waterfront and the Hudson River Park, acknowledging the surrounding context both in relationship to building size and neighbors’ views, and alleviating traffic noise. The leafy green courtyards that pop up within this new residential typology help to balance a steeply sloped facade, 450-feet at its peak. Designed for client Durst Fetner Residential, the building offers both a cultural and commercial program and will accommodate 600 residential units varying in size.

Follow the break for the architect’s description and more photographs.

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Architects: BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group Location: Manhattan, New York, USA Partner in Charge: Bjarke Ingels Project Leader: Beat Schenk Project Architect: Sören Grünert Project Team: Thomas Christoffersen, Celine Jeanne, Daniel Sundlin, Alessandro Ronfini, Aleksander Tokarz, Alessio Valmori, Alvaro Garcia Mendive, Felicia Guldberg, Gabrielle Nadeau, Ho Kyung Lee, Julian Liang, Julianne Gola, Lucian Racovitan, Marcela Martinez, Maria Nikolova, Minjae Kim, Mitesh Dixit, Nicklas Rasch, Riccardo Mariano, Stanley Lung, Steffan Heath, Thilani Rajarathna, Xu Li Architect of Record: SLCE Architects Landscape Architects: Starr Whitehouse Structural: Thornton Tomasetti MEP: Dagher Engineering Civil: Langan Engineering Construction Manager: Hunter Roberts Transportation: Philip Habib & Assoc. Building Envelope: Israel Berger & Assoc. Marketing: Nancy Packes Vertical Transportation: Van Deusen & Assoc. Acoustical: Cerami & Assoc. Wind: CPP Environmental: AKRF Client: Durst Fetner Residential Project Area: 870,000 sqf Renderings & Animation: German Glessner

Situated on a prominent waterfront site just across the East River from the United Nations and Roosevelt Island, the Queens Library at Hunters Point is scheduled to begin construction early next year. The design, which was approved this month is a collaboration between Steven Holl and partner Chris McVoy.

When we visited Steven Holl Architects we had a chance to see the design of Queens Library at Hunters Point on the boards. Check out our recent features of works by Steven Holl Architects, including the master plans and buildings for Hangzhou Normal University in China, the Glasgow School of Art, and our previous coverage of Queens Library at Hunters Point.

Further project description of the new Queens Library at Hunters Point and images following the break.

Architects: Steven Holl Architects Location: Hunters Point, New York City, New York, USA Design Architects: Steven Holl and Chris McVoy

The open international ideas competition, hosted by suckerPUNCH, is for a new, larger home for the museum of cartoon and comic art . The museum was established in 2001 and currently is based in the Soho area of Manhattan in New York City. The main goal of the museum is to educate the public about comic and cartoon art, how it is crafted, and how it reflects history. More images and descriptions of winning entries after the break.

Or Regev and Shirly Kujawski shared their entry for the new Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art, hosted by Sucker Punch Daily. The project is located at Essex Market in New York City, nearby the Williamsburg Bridge. The architects approached their design for the proposal for MoCCA as an extension of the media that the museum is designed to house and present.

Read on for more on this project after the break.

LightHearted is the winning design for this years Times Square Valentine, an annual competition to deign and build a heart for Times Square. Designed by Freecell, a 2010 P.S.1 contestant, in collaboration with Peter Dorsey, the ten-foot diameter heart is a light weight construction, with five pairs of aluminum elliptical loops radially arranged with rotating connections. The structure is covered with an open weave red fabric that both captures and reflects light while letting wind pass through.

LightHearted is an interactive installation, six people will hold the heart up for fifteen minute intervals. The ten-day event, February 10 to February 20, will need over 2,600 volunteers to share in this collective experience.

Head to the LightHearted website and sign up for your fifteen minutes on their volunteer calendar!

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Architects: Freecell, and Peter Dorsey Location: 46th Street and Broadway, New York City, New York, USA Web Design: Deelux Sponsor: Times Square Alliance Public Art Program Photographs: Courtesy of Freecell

This years architectural events in New York are bound to have a meaningful effect on the years to come; the decision by NYU to add another tower complementing I.M Pei’s existing Silver Towers complex (rather than their initial plan to demolish them), the opening of the first section of Brooklyn Bridge Park coupled with the completion of the High Line has re-established New York City as a key model to reference when it comes to designing urban public space, and finally construction began on Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial, by Louis Kahn, to name a few.

From transportation, urban planning, exhibitions, residential and office buildings follow the break to see the New Yorkers list of some of the most influential decisions surrounding architecture over the past year in New York.

We received the following exhibition by Chandler Ahrens and John Carpenter. It is located in Brooklyn, New York City, and it was inaugurated on the occasion of the conference ACADIA 2010 LIFE in:formation hosted by The Cooper Union. It examines concepts, tools and technologies that implement responsive and generative aspects of information in the design process.

The exhibition chairs are Chandler Ahrens, Michael W. Su and Axel Schmitzberger and conference chairs are Pablo Lorenzo-Eiroa, Aaron Sprecher and Shai Yeshauyahu.

Further information and photos after the break.

Architects Leong Leong recently shared their photographs from Turning Pink at W/ Project Space in New York’s Chinatown. Made from 3inch rigid insulation and mirrored acrylic this temporary and site-specific installation was part of a series that ‘explore the translation of a legible figure into a continuous visual field’.

More photographs and drawings about the Turning Pink installation following the break.

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Architects: Leong Leong Architecture Location: New York City, New York, USA Principals-in-Charge: Dominic Leong and Chris Leong Project Team: Nathan Smith, Christina Galvez, Sarah Carpenter, Greg Bugel, Brittany Drapac, Naomi Szto Builder: Leong Leong Architects Sponsors: 3.1 Phillip Lim and Pabst Blue Ribbon Project Area: 60 sqf Project Year: 2010 Photographs: Courtesy of Leong Leong Architecture