New York, New York, USA
New York-based SHoP architects complete the exterior of a super tall skyscraper in Manhattan, the tallest residential building in the Western hemisphere, paying respect for the architecture of the past, looking backward to create a new design language.
Designed for JDS Development, the 111 West 57th Street building emerges from “Steinway Hall,” a New York landmark building, built in 1925 by Warren & Wetmore architects, the architects of Grand Central Station, and home of the Steinway & Sons Piano Company.
SHoP Architects are honoring the craft of the Steinway piano along with the important connection to historic New York architecture, integrating into their designs meticulous ornamentation along its facade and interiors as a reinterpretation of historic motifs with a contemporary expression.
The tower’s form is also a bold interpretation of what is possible within the requirements of the Midtown Manhattan zoning envelope.
Mandated setbacks were multiplied where the building form contacts the sky-exposure plane, resulting in a feathered rather than a stepped profile.
The setbacks serve as sites for a finial at the top of each column of the terra-cotta ornament that rises on the east and west facades.
Without mimicking historic precedent, this approach unifies the massing of 111 West 57th Street in the tradition of classic towers such as One Wall Street, 30 Rockefeller Center, or the Empire State Building.
The tower’s facade is made of thousands of large terracotta panels that wrap its east and west sides— each panel is individually cast, fired, and hand-glazed, creating a radiantly striated pattern that accommodates subtle openings in glass and bronze.
Those panels are stacked into an involuted pattern, like a softly breaking wave.
SHoP Architects’ 111 West 57th Street skyscraper is ready to become Manhattan’s contemporary iconic building paying homage to other historic New York buildings.
Project: 111 West 57th Street Tower Facade
Architects: SHoP Architects
Original Architects: Warren & Wetmore
MEP Engineers: Jaros, Baum & Bolles
Civil Engineer: AKRF engineering, p.c
Developers: JDS development group, Property Markets Group, Spruce Capital Partners
Photographers: David Sundberg, Evan Joseph, The Dronalist
