Tag Archives: postmodern

245 Tenth Avenue

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Hovering over New York’s High Line in Chelsea, 245 Tenth Avenue is a shining example of metallic architecture. Or is it?

The stamped-steel and glass luxury condo (apartments at $5 million) presents complex facades: Stark stainless walls overlooking the corner gas station, random glass and steel patterns on the Tenth Avenue and High Line facades. The effect, according to the architects, is meant to evoke images of smoke puffing from the steam locomotives that once chugged along the High Line’s rails.

Real estate blog The Real Deal sniped, “To say that 245 10th Avenue is Manhattan’s latest contribution to the cult of ugliness is not necessarily as disrespectful as it sounds. Like the rebarbative High Line 519 one block south on 23rd Street, 245 10th Avenue is a particularly eccentric example of Mod-meets-deconstruction, with retro-glances to the aesthetics of the 1960s and forward glances to what we must pray is not the future of architecture.”

But the Empire Guides blog said, “245 10th Avenue is a stunning building overlooking the High Line Park and is one of the most impressive architectural spectacles along the length of the green space.”

Metal panels are becoming more common as architectural skin, but they invite comparison to elegant Deco-era classics like the Socony-Mobil Building and the Chrysler Building.

What’s your take?

245 Tenth Avenue Vital Statistics
  • Location: 245 Tenth Avenue at W 24th Street
  • Year completed: 2010
  • Architect: Della Valle Bernheimer (Jarred Della Valle, Andrew Bernheimer)
  • Floors: 11
  • Style: Postmodern
245 Tenth Avenue Recommended Reading

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324 E 51st Street

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324 E 51st Street is not your typical townhouse. It’s startling, even for New York architecture. But there is reason behind the perforated skin.

The building may remind you of Cassa NY, though on a smaller scale. The architect explains the facade as a way to reference rather than mimic its neighbors: The perforations are the size and shape of bricks.

Why?

Behind the street wall there are no traditional rooms to hold traditional windows. The stair and elevator core was moved to the front, to consolidate space and create a “vertical loft.” See the project video – it makes sense.

Thinking outside the box, even if it looks like a box.

324 E 51st Street Vital Statistics
  • Location: 324 E 51st Street between First and Second Avenues
  • Year completed: 2009
  • Architect: Peter L. Gluck + Partners
  • Floors: 4
  • Style: Postmodern
324 E 51st Street Recommended Reading

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One Lincoln Plaza

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One Lincoln Plaza (aka ASCAP Building) was the first residential tower to go up in Lincoln Square after completion of Lincoln Center. But it’s not exactly what the developers had in mind, thanks to a scrappy holdout – the owner of a five-story brick-and-brownstone on W 63rd Street.

There are two versions of what transpired between tenement owner Col. Jehiel R. Elyachar and developer Paul Milstein. The New York Times’ account and Holdouts!: The Buildings That Got in the Way differ in some details, but essentially the Colonel kept raising the price of his $50,000 property to more than $600,000. Exasperated, the Milsteins decided to build around the tenement (a city-mandated park had already been cut out of One Lincoln Plaza’s footprint).

One Lincoln Plaza Vital Statistics
  • Location: 20 W 64th Street at Broadway
  • Year completed: 1972
  • Architect: Philip Birnbaum & Associates
  • Floors: 43
  • Style: Postmodern
One Lincoln Plaza Recommended Reading

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160 E 22nd Street

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160 E 22nd Street is a brash condominium tower cantilevered over a pair of holdout townhouses on Third Avenue. It’s an astounding sight: 16 stories of grey limestone and glass suspended 25 feet over the fragile-looking (and nearly vacant) mid-block buildings.

It looks odd, but the final structure is an improvement over three earlier plans, which had been ridiculed as “Fortress of Solitude,” “Green Monster,” and “The Thing That Ate Gramercy.”

Owners of the holdout buildings weren’t willing to sell their sites, but they did sell air rights. The moral of this real estate tale: If you can’t buy, cantilever.

(The Curbed NY blog has start-to-finish coverage. Also see The New York Times’ The Hangover: Cantilevered Buildings of New York.)

160 E 22nd Street Vital Statistics
  • Location: 160 E 22nd Street at Third Avenue
  • Year completed: 2014
  • Architect: Perkins Eastman
  • Floors: 21
  • Style: Postmodern
160 E 22nd Street Recommended Reading

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30 E 85th Street

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30 E 85th Street towers over its Madison Avenue neighbors and sports an illuminated crown, but it’s the high ceilings and real plaster walls that make this condo stand out from contemporary apartment buildings.

According to The New York Times, some potential buyers forced another “prewar” touch – larger apartments. Original plans called for 104 apartments; some units were combined, reducing the total to 90.

30 E 85th Street Vital Statistics
  • Location: 30 E 85th Street at Madison Avenue
  • Year completed: 1987
  • Architect: Schuman, Lichtenstein, Clamon & Efron (SLCE)
  • Floors: 30
  • Style: Postmodern
30 E 85th Street Recommended Reading

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