Rendering of 262 Fifth Avenue looking south (Credit DBOX)
New York City is again poised to become the supertall skyscraper capital of the globe. Surprising, considering that rising Asian economies have more to prove, American infrastructure is crumbling, and, as President Biden mentioned on Saturday, the U.S. is 35th out of 37 major countries when it comes to investing in early education for childhood education and care. Yet still, the country's premier city hasn't lost its mettle to build tall buildings, the ultimate expression of American capitalism despite the country's ambivalent attitude towards its urban centers.
As the pandemic sputters on, with some kind of culmination in sight, developers are dusting off plans to time a soon under-supplied market just right. Dotted around Midtown and Midtown South, assemblages of pre-war buildings are wrapped in netting in preparation for a date with the wrecking ball, and mothballed sites are coming back to life bringing all the clamor and aggravation that goes with building in congested Manhattan.
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One such plot at the southwest corner of 29th Street, 262 Fifth Avenue, is suddenly bursting with activity after lying fallow for more than three years. Since demolishing degraded vestiges brownstone mansions in 2017, construction workers have recently begun excavation work for a deep foundation that will support a 1,000-foot-tall condominium set to become the tallest building between the Empire State Building and the World Trade Center downtown, and dethrone the nearby, 673-foot-tall 277 Fifth Avenue as the tallest building on the avenue.
The venture is being steered by Israeli-Russian billionaire Boris Kuzinez, operating under the alias Five Points Development. Over the last decade, the firm quietly assembled a three-building parcel to the tune of $102 million with enough untapped development rights to either build a slender soaring tower or a girthier mid-rise. The firm decidedly chose to go with the former and spun off 260 Fifth Avenue, the southernmost building in the assemblage, for $52.5 million earlier this year.
(DBOX)
Renderings credit of Mir.no via Meganom and Five Points Development
East elevation with its porthole-like windows (MIR.no)
Looking up from Fifth Avenue (Mir.no)
Designed by the Moscow-based architecture firm Meganom, the new supertall will sharply interrupt an iconic view found between the Flatiron Building and the Empire State Building on Fifth Avenue. With sheer walls positioned to the east and west and glass curtain walls facing north and south, the design allows for column-free living spaces that best capitalize on sweeping views of downtown and Midtown. Deviating from the central cores typically found in Manhattan skyscrapers, the core, which houses mechanicals and elevators, is shifted to the tower's western perimeter, giving units interruption-free spaces and likely the feeling of floating above the city. The voids at and near the top of the tower are likely to mitigate the effects of the wind on the slender tower.
FNA Engineering Services, P.C.is the engineer of record for the excavation and foundation support, CM & Associates is the project manager, and SLCE is listed as the architect of record. While the design is rather offensive and somewhat sinister, the engineering is cutting edge. This can-do spirit of engineering is what New York was built on and the prospect of making ever-larger profits (and flaunting it) has driven more than two dozen supertall condo developments into the sky in recent years and in years to come.
With just 41 condo residences, all units in the 54-story tower will be either full-floors or duplexes. Given the caliber and scale of the project, its homes will be unapologetically pricey. Amenities are to include a fitness center, a common terrace, a swimming pool, and an incredible shared roof deck with views nearly-equivalent to those seen on the Empire State Building's 86th-floor observatory.
Construction permits were fully approved this fall, and the onset of construction is among the surest signs that the city's pre-pandemic hubris has returned. Moreso, with the incoming Bitcoin-loving mayor Eric Adams facing annual budget shortfalls for years to come, there is now a more pressing need to drive the city's economy higher than ever before.
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