Element, 555 West 59th Street: Review and Ratings

Review of 555 West 59th Street by Carter Horsley

Element is a 35-story, reflective-glass residential condominium tower at 555 West 59^th Street that is notable for its sculpted form that includes a collared top of corner balconies, above shared angled balconies on a different façade, and many rounded corners.

It was designed by SLCE and developed by Brack Capital, which is headed by Dan Azogui, Continental Venture Realty of which Jane Gol is a principle, and COALCO International.

The building, which also has an address of 248-254 West 60^th Street, was completed in 2007 and has 186 units.

Bottom Line

It may look like the world’s most high-tech cookie-cutter or surgical implement for tunneling through to China, but it’s merely one of the West Side’s wilder, and more distinctive, reflective-glass towers near the Hudson River.

Description

This is not your typical, symmetrical, reflective-glass apartment tower.

It is a 21^st Century, streamlined, urban apartment-ship that seems set to take off into the sunsets over the nearby Hudson River.

It is certainly the most distinctive of the cluster of reflective-glass apartment towers that sprouted in this once forlorn low-rise district in the early years of this millennium.  The cluster is south of the phalanx of fairly similar apartment towers designed by Costas Kondylis for Donald Trump and the Extell Development a few blocks to the north facing the river.

Its unusual form is a precursor to Extell’s planned Riverside Center nearby that is being designed with assorted bumps and angles by Christian de Portzamparc.

Amenities

The building has its own “great lawn.”

The building has 24-hour Abigail Michaels concierge service, a garage, cold storage, a residents’ lounge, a fitness center, basketball and squash courts, a 60-foot lap pool, a sundeck, a garden and indoor and outdoor children’s playrooms.

The building is pet-friendly.

Apartments

About half of the units are one-bedrooms, 30 percent are two-bedrooms and 20 percent are three-bedrooms.

Apartments have 9-foot-six-inch to 10-foot ceilings, open kitchens with Sub-Zero and Bosch appliances, wide plant oak flooring, and washers and dryers.

Bathrooms have limestone tiling and Zuma soaking tubs.

About 60 percent of the apartments have balconies.

Duplex penthouse units have wrap-around balconies.

There are also some “town homes” with private gardens.

Apartment 10D has an entry foyer that leads past a pass-through kitchen to a 19-foot-long living/dining room next to a 15-foot-long bedroom and both rooms open onto a curved, 114-square-foot balcony.

Apartment 10G is a two-bedroom-unit with a pass-through kitchen and a 22-foot-long living/dining room and a 15-foot-long bedroom, both with large, curved windows walls.

Apartment 12B is a three-bedroom unit with a large foyer that opens onto a 16-foot-long dining area adjacent to a 22-foot-long living room with an open kitchen.  The living room and one of the bedrooms have long curved window walls.

Apartment 24B is a two-bedroom unit with a foyer that opens onto a 20-foot-long living/dining room with an open kitchen that opens onto a very large terrace.

Apartment 24D has a 14-foot-long entry foyer that leads past a pass-through kitchen into a 26-foot-long living room that has a 12-foot-long dining area and also a 53-foot-long terrace.  The master bedroom and one of the four other bedrooms have small terraces and the living room and one of the bedrooms have curved window walls.

Apartment 26B is a two-bedroom unit with a 20-foot-long living/dining room with an open kitchen and a bedroom with a curved window wall and a four-sided terrace.

Apartment 28D has a 20-foot-long living room adjacent to a 13-foot dining area with an open kitchen and an 11-sided wrap-around terrace with two entrances from the apartment.