Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA

Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior PhotographyLittle Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography, WaterfrontLittle Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior PhotographyLittle Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior PhotographyLittle Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - More Images+ 36

  • Design Director: Thomas Heatherwick
  • Group Leader: Mat Cash
  • Project Leaders: Paul Westwood, Neil Hubbard
  • Technical Design Leader: Nick Ling
  • Project Team: Sofia Amodio, Simona Auteri, Mark Burrows, Jorge Xavier Méndez- Cáceres, John Cruwys, Antoine van Erp, Alex Flood, Michal Gryko, Ben Holmes, Ben Jacobs, Francis McCloskey, Stepan Martinovsky, Simon Ng, Wojtek Nowak, Giovanni Parodi, Enrique Pujana, Akari Takebayashi, Ondrej Tichý, Ahira Sanjeet, Charles Wu, Meera Yadave
  • Executive Architects: Standard Architects
  • Making Team: Jordan Bailiff, Einar Blixhavn, Darragh Casey, Hayley Henry, Hannah Parker, Luke Plumbley, Jeff Powers
  • Client: Hudson River Park Trust (HRPT) & Pier 55 Project Fund (P55P)
  • Main Contractor : Hunter Roberts Construction Group
  • Marine Engineers: MRCE
  • Cost Consultants: Gardiner & Theobald
  • City: New York
  • Country: United States
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Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography
© Timothy Schenck

Text description provided by the architects. Little Island is a public park that shelters three new performance venues on the Hudson River. Designed as a haven for people and wildlife, it is a green oasis, held above the water by sculptural planters, and located just a short walk across a gangplank from Manhattan’s Lower West Side.

Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography
© Timothy Schenck
Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Image 32 of 41
Park plan spring
Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Image 26 of 41
© Timothy Schenck

Heatherwick Studio was initially invited by philanthropist Barry Diller and the Hudson River Park Trust to create a pavilion for a new pier off the southwest of Manhattan. Instead of designing a decorative object to sit in the Hudson River Park, the design team saw an opportunity to rethink what a pier could be. The starting point was not the structure, but the experience for visitors: the excitement of being over the water, the feeling of leaving the city behind and being immersed in greenery – inspired by Central Park, where it’s possible to forget that you are in the midst of the most densely populated city in the United States.

Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography, Waterfront
© Timothy Schenck
Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Image 39 of 41
General pier section B
Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography, Waterfront
© Timothy Schenck

Piers were traditionally flat to allow boats to dock, but did they have to be? In contrast to the flat streets of Manhattan, the design team wanted to create a new topography for the city, which could rise up to shape a variety of spaces. The first iteration was a curled leaf form floating on the water, its veins rising like ribs at the edges to shelter the space from the wind. The idea of raising the park on its foundations came from the existing wooden piles in the water, remnants of the many piers that used to extend from the shoreline of Manhattan. Beneath the visible tips of the wood, the piles have become an important habitat for marine life and are a protected breeding ground for fish.

Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography
© Angela Weiss, Getty Images
Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography
© Timothy Schenck
Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography
© Timothy Schenck

Heatherwick Studio envisaged the pier as a complete experience; a single, cohesive object, rather than unrelated elements stuck together. New piles would be necessary to support any type of pier. Instead of sticks holding up a deck, the piles become the deck – they extend into planters that join together to create the park’s surface. The height of the piles varies to create the park’s contours: the corner of the pier is lifted to allow sunlight to reach the marine habitat, and the edge falls to define hills, viewpoints and to carve out a natural amphitheatre for performances. In this way, the pier and its supporting structure are one.

Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography
© Timothy Schenck
Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography
© Timothy Schenck

The planters or ‘pots’ are filled with more than a hundred different species of indigenous trees and plants, which encourage biodiversity and are able to thrive in New York’s climate – each corner of the island represents a different microclimate. To determine the pots’ form, the design team looked to nature and the mosaic of ice that forms around the wooden piles when the river freezes. The studio reinterpreted this in a tessellated pattern that appears organic but uses repeated elements that could be standardised for fabrication. Care was taken to vary the angle and repetition of pots at the perimeter, where they were most visible. To give the structural concrete a smooth, tactile quality, Heatherwick Studio worked closely with a local fabricator. The precast components were transported by boats and assembled on site, minimising disruption to the city.

Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA - Exterior Photography, Waterfront
© Timothy Schenck

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Project location

Address:Little Island, Pier 55 at Hudson River Park Hudson River Greenway, New York, NY 10014, United States

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Location to be used only as a reference. It could indicate city/country but not exact address.
About this office
Cite: "Little Island Park / Heatherwick Studio + MNLA" 27 May 2021. ArchDaily. Accessed . <https://www.archdaily.com/962374/little-island-park-heatherwick-studio> ISSN 0719-8884

© Timothy Schenck

纽约55号码头“小岛”公园 / Heatherwick Studio

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