A gallery-packed block of West Chelsea is set to receive another mixed-used residential development. Yesterday, The Real Deal reported that a new building application was filed to construct a 20-story, 172,000-square-foot tower at 540 West 21st Street. The development site is across from the recently-finished condo 551W21, and a stone’s throw from the High Line, Chelsea Piers, and the Hudson River waterfront. The Atlantic Foundation sold Uri Chaitchik’s Casco Development the lot at 538-540 West 21st in 2014 for $50 million in 2014. City property records also show the developer, under the LLC 540 West 21st Street Holdings, acquired the parcels at 550 West 21st Street/128 Eleventh Avenue for $45 million in April 2015.
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Adamson Associates, the designer of One Manhattan Square, is listed as the architect of record, but a more marketable architect may be handling the design. The building will have gallery exhibition spaces and offices on the first two floors and 36 residences, presumably condos, above. The tower will top out at 250 feet tall, the height limit of the area. It will likely be similar in stature to the Norman Foster-designed condo 551W21 and the Jean Nouvel-designed condo 100 Eleventh Avenue. The building will be crowned with three penthouses that should have sweeping views of the waterfront and Manhattan skyline. Listed amenities are to include a swimming pool, fitness center, spa with plunge pool, a steam room, sauna and a hot stone room.
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In November 2016, Studio Seilern Architects (SSA) unveiled images for a 24-floor tower at the site that would have gallery spaces and a sculpture garden in its podium and residential units above. It is unknown if the firm is involved in the current venture.
Back in 2002, 540 W. 21st was set to be redeveloped with a new building for Eyebeam. Designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, a radical undulating structure was put forward that would be the city's first institution dedicated exclusively to new media art. The building would have houses a museum of art and technology, artist-in-residence studios, education center, multi-media classrooms, state-of-the-art theater and digital archive.
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