21 West End Avenue: Review and Ratings

Review of 21 West End Avenue by Carter Horsley

This impressive, 43-story, mixed-use residential complex at 21 West End Avenue between 60^th and 61^st streets in the Riverside Center complex on the Upper West Side was erected by The Dermot Company and was completed in 2016.

It has 616 rental apartments of which 127 are “affordable” units. 

The apartment building was designed by SCLE and its interiors are by ICRAVE.

The 529-foot-high, glass tower has a slant roof and a light-colored stone, low-rise, 700-seat school from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade at its base along West End Avenue that has been designed by Richard Dattner with a mid-block courtyard framed by a large hole in its façade below a slant roofline. 

The light-color façades of the school continue around the base of the building except for the area beneath the pilotis.

The attractive, glass-clad apartment building has an entrance tucked beneath a mid-rise glass box that is perched on 6 tall, slim pilotis that recall Philip Johnson’s unbuilt scheme for a Lehman Brothers skyscraper in Lower Manhattan in 1967 or Kevin Roche’s unbuilt scheme for a Lower Manhattan skyscraper on “stilts” for the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

The Riverside Center complex was initially part of Donald Trump’s Riverside South development but he sold the southern end of it to Extell Development, which is headed by Gary Barnett.  Mr. Trump built several of the complex’s towers at its north end and Mr. Barnett built several at the south end.

Mr. Barnett and the Carlyle Group commissioned Christian de Portzamparc to create a master plan for the Riverside Center complex and later sold off two of its five sites on its north side. 

The first of these was erected at One West End Avenue by The Elad Group and Silverstein Properties and was designed by Pelli Clarke Pelli and Goldstein Hill & West with 246 market-rate condominium apartments and 116 “affordable” units with a “poor door.”

21 West End Avenue is just to the south of a new Collegiate School building designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox that is just behind Extell’s Aldyn building facing the Hudson River.

Bottom Line

This large building has 616 rental apartments and a great many amenities next to low-rise public school with a cut-out façade at the northeastern corner of Riverside Center.

Description

The complex’s piece de resistance is its very large, wooden and enterable stegosaurus in the colorful children’s playroom in the apartment building.

The stegosaurus presumably wandered in from the school’s courtyard with its large cut-out white façade on West End Avenue beneath the glass-clad façades of the much larger apartment building.

Amenities

The building has a doormen, a concierge, a children’s playroom, a media room, an indoor  swimming pool with cabanas and a screening room, cold storage, a roof garden terrace with cabanas and BBQ grills, a fitness center with a yoga studio and a boxing studio, a living room with a fireplace, a billiards room, a chef’s kitchen, a game room, a wine tasting room, a bar and café, a golf simulator, an indoor dog park operated by Biscuits and Bath, a library, a hobby shop and workshop, a catering kitchen and a garage.

Apartments

Apartments have Bosch washers and dryers and Kitchenaid appliances.

Apartment 3109 is a three-bedroom unit with an entry foyer that leads to a 23-foot-wide, corner living room with slightly angled walls and a kitchen with a breakfast bar.

Apartment 3601 is a two-bedroom unit with an entry foyer that leads to a 19-foot-long corner living room adjacent to an enclosed and windowed kitchen.

Apartment 1621 is a two-bedroom unit with an entry foyer that leads to the kitchen with a breakfast bar and a 24-foot-long living room.

Apartment 2507 is a two-bedroom unit with an entry foyer across from a kitchen with a breakfast bar that leads to an 18-foot-long living room.

Apartment 2604 is a one-bedroom unit with an long entry foyer that leads to a 21-foot-long, slightly angled living room with a kitchen with a breakfast bar.

Apartment 2605 is a one-bedroom unit with a long entry foyer that leads past a kitchen with a breakfast bar to a 19-foot-long living room.

Apartment 2513 is a studio unit with an entry foyer that leads past an open kitchen with a breakfast far to a 19-foot-long living room.