New York, New York, USA
As part of a larger revitalization of Manhattan’s Midtown West, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill have designed a new mixed-use neighborhood that is built above active railroad tracks where minimal buildable land existed.
With a master plan and four of its six buildings designed and engineered by SOM, the project is an exemplar of what an integrated firm can accomplish.
The buildings are organized around a series of distinct plazas, enabled by the engineering of a 2.6-acre platform that covers the rail tracks.
The development’s central plaza is lined with a combined 225,000 square feet of retail. From Ninth Avenue, the public space forms a series of urban corridors along West 31st and West 33rd Streets, and the central plaza picks up where West 32nd Street—which terminates at Penn Station on Seventh Avenue—leaves off.
Together, these urban connections create a gateway between Hudson Yards to the west and Penn Station to the east.
It also completes the major reactivation of the streetscape on Manhattan’s Far West Side — a revitalization in which SOM has played an integral role, from the concourse improvements at Penn Station to the transformation of the James A. Farley Post Office Building into Moynihan Train Hall.
Located at the northeast and southeast corners of the site, One Manhattan West and Two Manhattan West both designed by SOM, targeting LEED Gold, are designed to welcome visitors arriving from the north, east, and south.
Each tower, clad in high-performance glass, is designed to accentuate an elegant simplicity that reflects the sky.
They enhance the public realm by extending the central plaza with additional space both indoors and outside.
With triple-height, transparent lobbies, the buildings provide views from corner to corner to reveal the central open space to pedestrians and offer a permeable connection to the central plaza.
The towers are set back from Ninth Avenue—opposite Moynihan Train Hall—to create welcoming outdoor plazas.
Project: Two Manhattan West
Architects: Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP (SOM)
Client: Brookfield Properties
Photographers: Dave Burk
