All articles by Ondel Hylton

Ondel is 6sqft's Market News Editor and the Digital Content Manager for CityRealty. He’s a lifelong New Yorker and comprehensive assessor of the city’s dynamic urban landscape. Ondel is an alumnus of Pratt Institute’s School of Architecture, and is a LEED accredited professional. Beginning his career as a Junior Architect at DaSILVA Architects, Ondel moved to the public sector as an Analyst Architect for the New York City Office of Management and Budget. Aside from CityRealty and 6sqft, he is a volunteer at the Skyscraper Museum, a docent for the Municipal Arts Society, and leads architectural tours around the city.

March 17, 2016

New Views Inside and Out of Renzo Piano’s First New York Residential Building

By Ondel Hylton

In January, 6sqft unveiled a set of illustrations and drawings detailing the exterior of Renzo Piano's forthcoming condominium tower 565 Broome Street (formerly known as 555 Broome). Now, with construction finally underway, the investors at Cindat Capital Management have published an online gallery providing a better taste of what's to come. Pitched between two of the city's most coveted neighborhoods, Soho and Tribeca, the much-anticipated development will rise nearly 320 feet in height along a full Varick Street block front between Broome and Watts Streets. The 25-story structure is being propelled forward by a joint venture among Bizzi & Partners Development, Michael Shvo and Itzhaki Acquisitions. Pritzker Prize-winning architect Renzo Piano was tapped as the design architect, while the local talents at SLCE are serving as the architects of record.
More details and renderings ahead

March 16, 2016

Housing Lottery Launches for Greenpoint Landing’s 33 Eagle Street, Rents Start at $494

By Ondel Hylton

Greenpoint Landing's third affordable housing building has kicked off its lottery process. The ground-up seven-story building at 33 Eagle Street will provide 97 newly constructed rental apartments priced well below market-rate rents. The 24 studios will be priced from $494 to $1,463 per month for annual household earnings ranging from $18,275 to $78,650. Its 29 one-bedrooms, designated for either one or two-person households, have rents ranging from $532 to $1,840 for household incomes from $19,612 to $78,650. And lastly, the building's 49 two-bedrooms are priced between $647 and $2,216, based on household sizes ranging from two to four persons with income ranges from $23,589 to $112,190 per year.
Find out more this way

March 16, 2016

Checking in on Downtown’s Next Supertall, 125 Greenwich Street by Rafael Viñoly Architects

By Ondel Hylton

It's been some time since 6sqft checked on 125 Greenwich Street, a slender tower that will soar more than 1,000 feet high and offer a limited collection of condominium residences with unparalleled views of the lower Manhattan skyline and beyond. Developed by a joint venture comprised of Michael Shvo, Bizzi + Partners Development, and Howard Lorber's Vector Group, the 9,000-square-foot corner site will yield 275 compact residences spread over 306,000 square feet of space, along with a retail- and amenity-filled podium. Plans submitted to the Department of Buildings in October show that most of the building's floor plates will house six apartments each.
Get a look at the current site

March 16, 2016

New Views of Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s Columbia School of Business Buildings

By Ondel Hylton

Back in 2004, Diller Scofidio + Renfro unveiled their proposal to build a new facility for the Eyebeam Atelier/Museum of Art and Technology. Their winning competition bid resembled the insides of a mitochondria dyed baby blue and blown up to an extreme proportion. DSR presented a more poetic explanation, referencing a pliable ribbon where horizontal surfaces turned into walls and vertical planes slouched into floors. The ribbon's thin divide would separate the production spaces of the museum from the presentation areas. The project was never realized, but fast forward 12 years, after the completion of the firms' well-regarded Lincoln Center overhaul and three phases of the High Line, and DSR has dusted off their undulating ribbons for Columbia University. Now that their Columbia University Medical and Graduate Education Building is nearly complete, their next set of wiggles are planned for a pair of academic buildings at the University's now-under construction Manhattanville campus in West Harlem. Amounting to 460,000 square feet of space, the two buildings will be separated by a central outdoor green space, and their insides will house classrooms, faculty offices, lounge areas, and support spaces for Columbia's Graduate School of Business.
Lots more renderings and details ahead

March 15, 2016

First Look at Austere East Harlem Tower Set for 1790 Third Avenue

By Ondel Hylton

Foundation and groundwork is making headway for an upcoming rental tower at 1790-1792 Third Avenue in East Harlem. Here's our first look at the IBI Group-Gruzen Samton-designed building that will bring some 95 new rentals to the block, where it will be the tallest structure, rising 13 stories and encompassing 48,377 gross square feet of space. The rather austere design features a gunmetal-grey facade, a single setback at the ninth floor, and south-facing lot-line windows that are allowed because the developers secured the adjacent building's air rights. According to the approved permits, there will be an ambulatory facility and commercial retail space at the ground floor, and residential amenities will include a roof deck and bike storage. Some upper floor units will have views overlooking the tree-filled Cherry Hill Playground, the recently rehabilitated El Barrio's Artspace PS109, and the East River.
More ahead

March 15, 2016

Demolition Permits Filed To Make Way for 25-Story New Hudson Yards Hotel

By Ondel Hylton

Demolition permits were filed yesterday to take down two small structures near the corner of West 31st Street and Dyer Avenue. Situated directly across from Brookfield's Manhattan West residential tower and just east of Hudson Yards, the parcel is owned by Arisa Realty, who purchased the buildings for $11 million in August of 2014. A revised new building application shows that the two- and one-story structures will be replaced by a 107,853-square-foot, 210-room hotel. The project's scale has been revised upward since initial filings, growing an additional 12,000 square feet and rising 25 stories instead of 21.
READ MORE

March 14, 2016

Queens’ New Skyline: A Rundown of the 30 Developments Coming to Long Island City

By Ondel Hylton

Watch out Hudson Yards, Midtown is moving east to Queens. Long Island City is sprouting a small city worth of skyscrapers, ushering in thousands of new residents, hundreds of hotel rooms, and a few hundred thousand square feet of office space. To help us visualize the neighborhood's upcoming transformation, the dynamos at Rockrose Development commissioned visualization experts Zum-3d to produce this exceptionally accurate depiction of the changes afoot. Inspired by the rendering, 6sqft has put together a rundown of the nearly 30 under-construction and proposed projects for the 'hood.
See the full roster ahead

March 14, 2016

First Look at Morris Adjmi’s Romanesque Design for Soho’s 134 Wooster Street

By Ondel Hylton

This past December, Premier Equities, with Morris Adjmi as the architect of record, filed new building permits to construct a 26,000-square-foot, seven-story office building at 134 Wooster Street. Thanks to an online version of the presentation the team will show to the LPC, we have our first look at Adjmi's design. The Wooster Street facade is articulated by a repeating successions of Roman-arched windows, referencing the area's signature cast-iron fronts. Since the site is squarely situated within the Soho-Cast Iron Historic District, the development team will need to muster the approvals of the Landmarks Preservation Commission to build their vision.
More details ahead

March 11, 2016

New Renderings of Boerum Hill’s Nevins Condominium, Teaser Site Launched

By Ondel Hylton

Walk down any of Downtown Brooklyn's high streets -- Court, Fulton, or Atlantic Avenue -- and you'll experience a palpable energy that can now rival any American downtown. Thanks to its cost advantages relative to Manhattan, the surging city economy, and attractive building stock, the district seems to have reached a level of vibrancy worthy of its borough's 2.1 million inhabitants. Since a major upzoning in 2004, the one-gritty hub has attracted thousands of residents and now has more than 41 million square feet of residential, commercial, and institutional space completed, under construction, or in the pipeline, according to an NYU Rudin Center report. Along the district's southern periphery, where its new soaring tower blocks transition into the genteel streetscapes of Boerum Hill, the Nevins condominium rises at 319 Schermerhorn Street. Now Curbed has spotted the first renderings of the 21-story, 73-unit development and the newly launched registration site for prospective buyers.
More details ahead

March 10, 2016

Property Markets Group Shares New Eye Candy of 111 West 57th Street

By Ondel Hylton

Here's a new set of images of Property Markets Group's and JDS Development's 111 West 57th Street. In case you haven't been paying attention, the highly-anticipated tower will be among the tallest residential skyscrapers in the world, climbing some 1,421 feet high to its tip. Designed by SHoP Architects, the feathery spire is sheathed in terra cotta, bronze and a glass curtain wall. The tower will be the most slender skyscraper in the world with a height to width ratio of 24:1.
More renderings ahead

S9 Architecture Reveals New Design for Apartment Tower at 111 Varick Street

By Ondel Hylton

Late last year 6sqft posted a gallery of renderings visualizing a new high-rise for Madigan Development and Robal Parking Corporation's development site at 111 Varick Street in Hudson Square. Now, on S9 Architecture's recently revamped website, we have a revised look at a different and enlarged design for the site. The published set of images shows a slightly taller tower of similar massing clad in a skin of rippling panels where each band of floors resembles a strip of paper repeatedly folded onto itself and thereafter wrapped around the building envelope.
More details ahead

March 9, 2016

First Look At Harlem’s Baldwin Condominiums, Inspired By James Baldwin

By Ondel Hylton

In a corner of Harlem hemmed in by a steep ravine within Jackie Robinson Park and the Harlem River, a residential enclave is undergoing a renaissance. Among a string of four recently finished sale buildings, a seven-story, six-unit condominium has begun work at 306 West 148th Street, between Bradhurst Avenue and Frederick Douglass Boulevard. Conceived by Bottom Line Construction & Development (no comment), the 10,000-square-foot building is to be called The Baldwin after the eminent Harlem-born novelist, poet, playwright and social critic, James Baldwin. Channeling the author's spirit, the condo will capture in its residences "the sophisticated details and artistic flare of contemporary Harlem living."
Find out more

March 9, 2016

Affordable Housing Lottery at Colgate Close Starts in Soundview, Priced $696/Month

By Ondel Hylton

In the Soundview neighborhood of the Bronx, the Arker Companies has commenced the affordable housing lottery process for their latest ground-up building, Colgate Close. Located at 1092 Colgate Street, where the semi-industrial area along the Bronx River evolves into a low-scale residential community, the five-story complex will contain 32 studio and one-bedrooms targeted for low-income households earning between $25,200 and $30,250 for a single person and $27,052 and $41,460 for two people. Depending on income, studios will be priced at $696 or $847 per month and one-bedrooms at $749 and $910 per month.
More details this way

March 5, 2016

East 61st Street Condo Finally Reveals Itself, $82.5M Sellout Projected

By Ondel Hylton

At the northeast corner of East 61st Street and Second Avenue, a long shrouded condominium project is finally showing us some skin. The 19-story building addressed at 301 East 61st Street exhibits a creamy stone exterior, with inset balconies and vertical fins projecting from a floor-to-ceiling glass curtain wall. The building is being developed by Orlando-based Inverlad Development who purchased the 3,800-square-foot lot for $15.4 million in 2012.
Find out more

March 4, 2016

MAP: Where to Find NYC’s Current Affordable Housing Lotteries

By Ondel Hylton

The number of affordable rental units up for grabs through the city and state's housing lotteries has been on the upswing. There are now more than 30 open to a variety of household sizes and incomes, with the bulk of the lotteries geared towards low-income households. For instance, in buildings currently accepting applications, annual incomes for a single-person household range from $18,789 to $36,300 and two-family households from $20,160 to $41,460. However, a growing number of drawings are now available to middle-income households, where for those open, a single person can make anywhere from $44,400 to $105,875 annually to qualify. To stay on top of it all, 6sqft gathered all affordable housing buildings now accepting applicants and compiled them into one handy, interactive map.
Check it out here

Affordable Housing

March 4, 2016

VIDEO: Get a Digital Tour of the Chelsea Market’s New Addition

By Ondel Hylton

Annual office rents in the West Chelsea/Meatpacking District area have been topping $90 per square foot with many creative and technology tenants searching for boutique-sized spaces. So it seems like the perfect time for Jamestown Properties to move forward with their piggybacking plan for Chelsea Market. Branding and visualization firm Neoscape put together a cheery film to market the upcoming building's new 240,000 square feet of office space. To be known as BLDG 18, the structure is being designed by Studios Architecture and will rise nine stories atop the westernmost building of the Chelsea Market complex and the High Line. The film shows a private 16th Street entrance for tenants, 40,000-square-foot floor plates, 40-foot-wide column bays, multiple levels of landscaped terraces providing a total of 21,000 square feet of outdoor space, panoramic views, easy access to the High Line, and of course, the block-long Chelsea Market food concourse at ground level.
Watch the video here

New Developments

March 4, 2016

VOA Architects Design 70-Story Mixed-Use Supertall for the Far West Side

By Ondel Hylton

Here's a first idea of what may be coming to a valuable far west side corner owned by former governor Elliot Spitzer. First spotted by the eagle-eyed SkyscraperPage, the scheme was prepared by VOA Architects for Highgate Hotels and shows an approximately 70-story, mixed-use tower stacked with a 1,000-key hotel with condominiums above. The site at 451 Tenth Avenue at 35th Street was picked up by Spitzer for $62 million in 2014 through a 99-year lease from Madd Equities. VOA's blog page states, "the project would have been the first new convention hotel in NY since the Marriott Marquis opened in 1985." Judging by the past-tense nature of the description, it seems this exact vision will not come to fruition.
More renderings ahead

March 3, 2016

Renzo Piano’s Ship-Like Academic Center Coming to Columbia’s Manhattanville Campus

By Ondel Hylton

On a triangular lot, where north-skewing West 125th Street meets West 129th Street, the Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW) and Dattner Architects have crafted a 56,000-square-foot, ship-like structure for Columbia University's Manhattanville Campus. Known as the University Forum and Academic Conference Center, the three-story building will host academic conferences, meetings, and symposia. It will contain a 430-seat auditorium, meeting rooms, and gathering spaces. According to Piano's page, "The building looks like a ship levitating above the light and transparent Urban Layer." Its prow points westward and may be just small enough to sail under the Riverside Drive Viaduct and into the Hudson River.
More details ahead

March 2, 2016

Grand, Under-Construction Carnegie Hill Townhouse Could be Yours for $18M

By Ondel Hylton

Pre-war architecture is alive and well on the Upper East Side. At 178 East 94th Street, along a bucolic, tree-lined stretch of Carnegie Hill, a six-story, 7,650-square-foot, single-family home is squeezing into place as if it's been on the brownstone block for decades. The 36.5-foot-wide home is being built and designed by Daniel Kohs, owner of Long Island-based Madik Realty. Called the Danville House, the home hit the market earlier this month for $18 million. The sole exterior rendering accompanying the listing shows a red-brick exterior accentuated by vertical piers, culminating into pointed and spherical pinnacles. It's crowned near its apex by an open colonnade not unlike that of Murray Hill's Morgan Lofts.
READ MORE

February 29, 2016

Riverside Center’s One West End Avenue Tops Off, Cantilevering Pool and All

By Ondel Hylton

Propelled skyward by the still-sizzling Upper West Side residential market and its dearth of buildable sites, the final phase of the Riverside South master plan is coming together alas. After decades on the drawing board, this southern-most, eight-acre segment collectively known as Riverside Center/Waterline Center has already spawned a pair of residential buildings designed by SLCE Architects and another by Pelli Clarke Pelli with Goldstein, Hill & West Architects (GHWA). Three other parcels to the west are now undergoing site preparation. Those lots will give rise to a trio condo and rental buildings whose developer, Boston-based General Investment and Development Companies (GID), has enlisted a trio of high caliber designers working with GHWA, the executive architect of record. Work has moved forward swiftly on the the plan's first two towers. The shorter of the pair, known as One West End , has just topped off its 491-foot concrete skeleton and is being developed through a partnership between the Elad Group and Silverstein Properties. The robust 41-story spire is the second tallest building on West End Avenue, only behind its more anonymous 521-foot-tall rental neighbor 21 West End.
Details, renderings, and construction photos this way

February 23, 2016

Groundwork Begins on Bjarke Ingels’ Curvaceous East Harlem Development

By Ondel Hylton

With approved permits in place, Blumenfield Development Group is ready to move forward on their Bjarke Ingels Group-designed mixed-use project at 146 East 125th Street between Lexington and Third Avenues. Initial ground testing has taken place, and a construction fence has been erected along the lot's northern 126th Street frontage. According to permits filed in December 2014, the upcoming 230,000-square-foot building will contain 40,000 square feet of commercial space and 233 apartments, 20 percent of which will be designated as affordable.
More details ahead

February 23, 2016

Rosario Candela-Designed Building at 915 West End Avenue Going Condo

By Ondel Hylton

West End Avenue is one of Manhattan's longest stretches of harmonious architecture. The nearly 50-block-long, better-looking half of Eleventh Avenue is the Upper West Side's answer to Park Avenue, without the median and with the community. The Avenue's rows of stately prewar buildings are raised to a mostly uniform height of 12 to 15 stories and appear as if some Haussmann-like visionary conceived their elegance and scale. Behind dignified masonry facades are wood-paneled lobbies and sprawling apartments that are stacked in classic sixes and sevens with staff quarters. Near the Avenue's starting point at Straus Park, at the northwest corner of 105th Street, 915 West End Avenue rises humbly without much fuss. The red-brick building, built in 1922, was designed by beloved architect Rosario Candela and is undergoing a conversion that would transform 43 of its 91 rental apartments into condominium residences, according to an offering plan submitted to the attorney general.
Find out more

February 23, 2016

First Look at MY Architect’s 19-Story Hotel Set for Jamaica’s Transit Hub

By Ondel Hylton

With all corners of the city bursting at their seams, once overlooked business nodes are experiencing a resurgence of construction activity. Perhaps most foreign and far-flung to Manhattanites is Jamaica, Queens, where a cluster of high-rises is rising around its transit hub, which serves LIRR commuters and is a terminus to JFK's AirTrain network. The neighborhood's latest large project to come forward is from Flushing-based Ampiera Group, who have proposed a 100,000-square-foot hotel and office tower at 90-75 Sutphin Boulevard, just one block from the transit center. The building's exterior, comprised of a mix of glass and stone, is designed by MY Architect, who are working with the development team on at least two Long Island City projects. Approved permits and documents filed last summer co-align with images published on the architect's website that call for a double-winged building with a low-rise leg fronting Sutphin Boulevard. The low-slung retail buildings along Archer Avenue will be demolished to create a plaza at the foot of the tower.
More views and details ahead

February 22, 2016

Pricing and Renderings Released for the Jackson, Industrial-Inspired Condo in Long Island City

By Ondel Hylton

Situated squarely between Long Island City's waterfront towers and its burgeoning Court Square and Queens Plaza business districts, an upcoming industrially-inspired condominium named the Jackson is beginning construction work. On Friday, the New York Times unveiled pricing information for the 70,000-square-foot project, and a polished set of renderings has been published on the developer's website. The 11-story, 54-unit project is being shepherded by a joint-venture among Charney Construction & Development, Ascent Development, and Tavros Capital. The development site, located around the corner from MoMA PS1, was formerly occupied by a parking lot and a nondescript two-story building. Fogarty Finger, the building's architects, have designed several other low- to mid-scale residential projects in LIC that complement the fleetingly-gritty neighborhood's aesthetic. Here they accomplish that by using raw material such as steel, concrete, and wood, as well as oversized windows that feel like an old industrial loft building.
This way for details, renderings, and pricing

February 20, 2016

Williamsburg’s William Vale Hotel Launches Website, New Renderings & Video

By Ondel Hylton

Williamsburg likely has the highest concentration of awful new buildings in the city. The neighborhood has lots of things going for it, but architecture has not been one of them. However, just north of Kiss + Cathcart's noteworthy Bushwick Inlet Park is a cluster of development that finally flaunts the design creativity for which the borough has become renowned. Centered around the Walentas' Wythe Hotel, four exciting new hotels and office buildings are in the works. Tallest of them all, and farthest along, is the 21-story, 250-foot William Vale Hotel between North 12th and North 13th Streets. The striking pile of structural acrobatics topped off last fall and recently launched their website with a handful of new renderings.
More info and all the renderings

All articles by Ondel Hylton

New Views Inside and Out of Renzo Piano’s First New York Residential Building

Housing Lottery Launches for Greenpoint Landing’s 33 Eagle Street, Rents Start at $494

Checking in on Downtown’s Next Supertall, 125 Greenwich Street by Rafael Viñoly Architects

New Views of Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s Columbia School of Business Buildings

First Look at Austere East Harlem Tower Set for 1790 Third Avenue

Demolition Permits Filed To Make Way for 25-Story New Hudson Yards Hotel

Queens’ New Skyline: A Rundown of the 30 Developments Coming to Long Island City

First Look at Morris Adjmi’s Romanesque Design for Soho’s 134 Wooster Street

New Renderings of Boerum Hill’s Nevins Condominium, Teaser Site Launched

Property Markets Group Shares New Eye Candy of 111 West 57th Street

S9 Architecture Reveals New Design for Apartment Tower at 111 Varick Street

First Look At Harlem’s Baldwin Condominiums, Inspired By James Baldwin

Affordable Housing Lottery at Colgate Close Starts in Soundview, Priced $696/Month

East 61st Street Condo Finally Reveals Itself, $82.5M Sellout Projected

MAP: Where to Find NYC’s Current Affordable Housing Lotteries

Park Slope's priciest townhouse is an $18M masterpiece of modern design

VIDEO: Get a Digital Tour of the Chelsea Market’s New Addition

VOA Architects Design 70-Story Mixed-Use Supertall for the Far West Side

Renzo Piano’s Ship-Like Academic Center Coming to Columbia’s Manhattanville Campus

Grand, Under-Construction Carnegie Hill Townhouse Could be Yours for $18M

Riverside Center’s One West End Avenue Tops Off, Cantilevering Pool and All

Groundwork Begins on Bjarke Ingels’ Curvaceous East Harlem Development

Rosario Candela-Designed Building at 915 West End Avenue Going Condo

First Look at MY Architect’s 19-Story Hotel Set for Jamaica’s Transit Hub

Pricing and Renderings Released for the Jackson, Industrial-Inspired Condo in Long Island City

Williamsburg’s William Vale Hotel Launches Website, New Renderings & Video

9 DeKalb Avenue in Downtown Brooklyn

All articles by Ondel Hylton

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