The Park Loggia, 15 West 61st Street: Review and Ratings

Review of 15 West 61st Street by Carter Horsley

This handsome, 32-story residential tower at 15 West 61st Street on the northwest corner of Broadway was developed in 2019 by AvalonBay Communities.  It has 172 condominium apartments. 

It is known as the Park Loggia because all of the east-facing tower units have deep, open loggias and the top floor has a triple-height loggia around its mechanical spaces. 

The 26-story tower is setback on a 6-story podium base. 

AvalonBay's other major projects in the Manhattan include Avalon Morningside at 1 Morningside Avenue, Avalon West  Chelsea at 282 11th Avenue, Avalon Bowery Place at 11 East 1st Street, and Avalon Midtown West at 250 West 50th Street, and Avalon Clinton at 252 West 52nd Street. 

This tower was designed by Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, which also designed the former building on the site, the 12-story building known as the American Bible Society.  In a May 14, 2019 article at 6sqft.com, Michelle Sinclair Colman remarked that "it is rare that a demolished building is rebuilt by the same architecture firm that designed it half a century ago." 

In his "Building Blocks" October 21, 2015 column in The New York Times, David W. Sanger wrote the following: 

"Angels have never been especially conspicuous around Columbus Circle in Manhattan.  But it is hard to look at 1865 Broadway, the former headquarters of the American Bible Society, and not think for a moment about the ladder of Jacob's dream, as described in Genesis 28:12.  If the bold, Brutalist rungs of the main façade do not persuade you of a biblical provenance, you are also free to read symbolism into the 12 deep recesses at each floor.  Might they represent the 12 tribes of Israel? Or the Twelve Apostles?" 

"The building," Mr. Dunlap continued, "was the first in the city to be constructed with load-bearing exterior walls of pre-cast concrete panels," adding "it never inspired rhapsodic appreciations."  "Joseph Kriskiewicz, an architectural historian, aptly called 1865 Broadway a 'very competent' and 'structurally expressive' late Modernist building that 'might have left the public cold.'" 

In their fifth edition to the AIA Guide to New York City Architecture, Norval White, Elliot Willensky and Fran Leadon noted that "the more recent high-tech steel and glass entry element relieves at close range, some of its overwhelming bulk" of the 1966 building. 

In their great New York 1960, Architecture and Urbanism Between the Second World War and the Bicentennial, Robert A. M. Stern, Thomas Mellins and David Fishman noted the building's "hulking presence...was set back from Broadway, failing to fill its irregularly shaped site and leaving a rather miserly plaza...." 

The building has about 70,000 square feet of retail space, almost half of which has been leased to Target. 

It now holds the building line on Broadway.

Bottom Line

This terra cotta-clad building, directly across Broadway from 15 Central Park West and one-block north of the former Time-Warner building fronting on Columbus Circle, has tall ceilings and a very prime Upper West Side location with very close excellent shopping and entertainment venues.

Description

The building has recessed windows and a porte-corchere entrance on the side-street that leads to a walnut-paneled lobby designed by Pembroke & Ives, which also designed the building's amenity spaces. 

The bottom two floors on Broadway have double-height windows.

Amenities

The building has a concierge, fitness center, a children's playroom, a golf simulator, a performance space and screening room and a musical practice room as well as a lounge with catering kitchen and wine storage.  The building has an entrance marquee and sidewalk landscaping.

Apartments

Apartment 6A is a four-bedroom unit with 2,029 square feet with a long entry foyer that leads to a 21-foot-long living/dining room with an open kitchen with an island. 

Apartment 23A is a three-bedroom unit with 1,916 square feet of interior space and 357 square feet of outdoor space, a long entry foyer that leads to a 18-foot-long living/dining room with an open kitchen with and island and an entrance to the long angled loggia. 

Apartment 6B is a two-bedroom unit with 1,338 square feet and an 18-foot-long living/dining room with an open kitchen with a breakfast bar. 

Apartment 30B is a two-bedroom unit with 1,156 square feet of indoor space and 154 square feet of outdoor space with a 17-foot-long living/dining room with an open kitchen and an open loggia. 

Apartment 2C is a one-bedroom unit with 826 square feet and a 16-foot-long living/dining room with an open kitchen. 

Apartment 6L is a one-bedroom unit with 775 square feet and a 17-foot-long living/dining room with an open kitchen with a breakfast bar.