DETAILS
A new residential tower has risen across the street from the Empire State Building. As a zoning incentive, a new public plaza was included to attract and accommodate the area’s tourists as well as its diverse office and residential neighborhood. The space is defined by a clean, contemporary design composition of spaces, elements and custom furniture meant to foster social seating. With very little sunlight available, the design has embraced glass-enclosed light elements such as pylons, feature walls, wall copings and in-ground linear fixtures to enrich the environment. Given the dearth of open spaces in the area and the high demand that was predicted through extensive research, a strategy for public seating choices was employed. A long distinctive banquette and entrance path is an armature from which shaded gardens, picnic tables and a raised seating overlook are arranged. The plaza has become an oasis of social activity throughout the day and brings tourists and hard-core New Yorkers together in a communal setting.
Shanghai International Dance Center
Inspired by the idea of movement, this collaboration with Studios Architecture achieves an artful harmony of building with landscape, program with site. The image of a dancer in grand jete kindled the designers’ imaginations and served as the project’s organizing idea. Asia’s first professional dance complex is tucked between a freeway, a subway station...
Capitol Plaza
Capitol Plaza is located in the lively neighborhood of Chelsea Heights amid weekend antiques markets, art galleries, hip hop stores, design studios, residential towers, and Flower District shops. This narrow swath cuts through a block just east of Sixth Avenue and is one of dozens throughout the densest portions of Manhattan that bring a moment of respite and ...
Faria Lima
A new office tower, theater and café pavilion known as Alameda is being built in the high end district of downtown Sao Paulo; the centerpiece of the site design is the Alameda civic plaza. Lifted gently above the street level, four generous steps invite visitors to enter and explore the plaza while branded light pylons at all major entrances serve as place mar...
Gate City Osaki
“I do sculpture as it relates to my designs, and as the sculpture emerges from the designs it becomes collaborative. This is gratifying because the sculpture is very much in keeping with the overall landscaping concept. It is not an afterthought,” writes Tom Balsley. Here we see the full integration of his sculptural expression in the overall landscape design ...