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About 1 York Street
In 2005, the Museum of the City of New York had an exhibition on TEN Arquitectos, a well-known Mexican architectural firm headed by Enrique Norten, and three of its new projects in New York City of which this building was one.
The other two projects were a new Brooklyn Public Library for the Visual and Performing Arts, and Harlem Park, a 380-ft.-high, mixed-use project with an undulating façade on 125th Street and Park Avenue. Those two projects unfortunately were not built.
This project, which has 43 condominium apartments and community space for the Chinese American Planning Council, has a very visible site in the north part of TriBeCa.
The project consists of an existing 6-story structure bounded by York, Canal and Laight Streets, the Avenue of the Americas and St. John’s Place, to which 6 setback stories have been added.
Stanley Perelman of JANI Real Estate is the developer.
The project was approved in 2005 by the City Council, but construction work revealed structural problems with one existing 19th Century wall that necessitated minor revisions to the overall plan. Those revisions required that the project get a variance, and the TriBeCa committee of Community Board 1 voted to recommend that the Board of Standards & Appeals approve the variance provided that the developer agree to stipulate that its retail spaces will not be leased to a bar or restaurant and that he not add a 2,000-square-foot penthouse that would add 12 feet to the building's height.
Mr. Perelman told the Community Board committee that the design revisions included relocating the garage from the southeast to the southwest corner of the site, a 500-square-foot reduction in space for the Chinese American Planning Council but a relocation of that space within the project for more efficient layouts, and adding 12 feet to the height of the building to provide for a new penthouse floor. The building’s floor-to-area ratio remained under the approved 6.5.
Bruce Ehrmann, a member of the committee, said that while he admired Mr. Norten as "one of the five or six greatest young architects," he found it "bothersome in principle" that the project is coming back with a revised plan. "I don’t want to be a stickler," he continued, but "there's a lot of height creep going on." He invoked Mel Brooks's "Engulf & Devour Inc." to suggest, with a bit of humor, that many developers ask for something and then nibble away and come back for a little more, again and again.
The building has an automated parking system for 47 cars in which residents can retrieve their cars from computer terminals in the garage or their own loft.
The lower base of the building has been reclad but retains much of its existing architectural style while the addition is largely glass and slightly angled at its center where its facade extends to the street. Part of the east side of the existing building is windowless because the building was reduced in size when the Sixth Avenue subway was built in 1927.
The fourth floor will have a swimming pool and gym.
Prices initially ranged from about $1 million for a one-bedroom apartment to $2.4 million for a two-bedroom, two-and-a-half bath apartment with about 1,820 square feet to about $15 million for a double-height penthouse.
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