Flowerbox Building, 259 East 7th Street: Review and Ratings

Review of 259 East 7th Street by Carter Horsley

The "Flowerbox Building" at 259 East 7th Street between Avenues C and D in the East Village is one of the most attractive new low-rise buildings in the city and easily the most attractive in the East Village.

The building has 8 condominium apartments.

The tree-lined block is one of the nicest in the East Village with several handsome townhouses and close proximity to several of the area s very lush and very impressive community gardens.

Seth Tapper is the developer and the building has been designed by Derek Sanders of CAN Resources and WSE Design Partnership Architects are the architects of record.

This building has a glass-and-metal entrance marquee and large multi-paned windows that recall some of the handsome pre-war industrial buildings in SoHo and TriBeCa. It is setback at the fifth floor and the top three floors are a penthouse apartment with some very large windows.

Eighteen-inch-deep planters run the width of the lower floors, adding to the lushness of this quiet neighborhood.

According to Gary Waisman of WYS Design Partnership Architects, this project began when architect Sanders and Mr. Tapper found a Japanese couple to pre-purchase the penthouse unit. The lower floors, he said, will contain 7 other units, mostly two-bedrooms.

A few doors to the west is the attractive Iglesia Cristiana Misionera at 247 East 7th Street and at 235 East 7th Street is a handsome orange-brick townhouse flanked by gardens. The northeast corner of 7th Street and Avenue C is an impressive three-story limestone building with a wonderfully colorful terra-cotta clock surround at the curved corner.

The development at 259 East 7th Street is also very close to the very handsome Police Service Area 4 building on the northeast corner of Avenue C and 8th Street, a banded striped two-tone gray-brick building that recalls some of the best work of architect Mario Botta. The southwest corner at the same intersection is occupied by the handsome yellow-and-red-brick, Art Deco-style, 7-story apartment building known as Eastville Gardens.

Derek Sanders is a partner with Serge Becker in CAN Resources and their portfolio includes the new restaurant at Lever House, a residential project at 115 Allen Street, the Standard Hotel in Los Angeles, the Area nightclub in TriBeCa, Fez and the Time Café in NoHo, the Mercer Hotel in SoHo, Joe's Bar at The Public Theater, Buddha Bar and Club USA.

Apartments have 12-foot-high, floor-to-ceiling windows, an installed flat-screen plasma television set in the living room and central air-conditioning and radiant floor heating and the building will have a part-time doorman, private keyed elevator, and garage and all bedrooms fact a community garden.

Two-bedroom, two-bath apartments range in size from 1,539 square feet to 2,780 square feet and one has 1,500 square feet of outdoor space, another has 84 square feet of outdoor space, and one has 86 square feet of outdoor space. Two of the two-bedroom-two-bath units have no outdoor space. There are two three-bedroom, three-bath apartments with 2,576 square feet each and two balconies with a total of 168 square feet. The penthouse has five bedrooms and five baths and 6,665 square feet and 1,500 square feet of outdoor space.

Kitchens have Veneta Cucine cabinetry, 6-burner Viking ranges, SubZero refrigerators, Bosch dishwashers and wine coolers.

Bathrooms have Jado faucets and Kohler sinks and toiler and a Neptune soaking tub.