All stories about "Battery Maritime Building"

Last week, the latest design for a hotel addition to the landmark Battery Maritime Building was unveiled. It represented a slight design departure from the initial proposal, but it was still big, boxy and made of glass (see: top left). Over on the Wired New York boards, the gang is a little bummed about the prospect of plopping a glass box on top of a treasured landmark, but they're also resigned to the fact that it's probably going to happen. But how to improve on the Rogers Marvel Architects design? Well, one Wiredling has a pretty interesting idea: a curved glass design like that of London's Kew Gardens. One quick foray into PhotoShop later, and boom, a new-look new-look Battery Maritime Building is born (top right). Can it be that something slapped together in five minutes by an amateur looks better than one of them professional dealies? Eh, we'll leave that for the Landmarks Preservation Commission to decide.
· Thread: Battery Maritime Building [Wired New York]
· New Battery Maritime Design More Landmark Friendly? [Curbed]
· Hey Battery Maritime Bldg: LPC is Just Not That Into You [Curbed]

On the top left up there is the first proposal for a new-look Battery Maritime Building, a long-planned $110 million makeover that would include a gourmet food market, 135-room hotel and a rooftop restaurant in the landmark building down on the southern tip of Manhattan. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your love/hate relationship with glass), the Landmarks Preservation Commission wasn't feeling the Rogers Marvel Architects design, so it was sent back to the drawing board. Today, the Downtown Express reveals the second try. The rooftop addition has been pushed back nine feet from the waterfront, and four historic cupolas have been restored. Are these changes enough to push the plan through? Maybe. Community Board 1 approved the design despite serious concerns about the addition, and next it'll be on to the LPC for a vote. No hearing date is scheduled yet, so opponents have plenty of time to sharpen the pickaxes.
· Battery design adds historic tops; wins some support [Downtown Express]
· Hey Battery Maritime Bldg: LPC is Just Not That Into You [Curbed]
· Battery Maritime Building Renovation Revealed [Curbed]

1) New York Times architecture critic Nicolai Ouroussoff finally got around to checking out the Hudson Yards plans, and woo boy, he is not happy. Ouroussoff drops the hammer on the whole process, writing that the proposals are "not just a disappointment for their lack of imagination, they are also a grim referendum on the state of large-scale planning in New York City." Wham! The Related bid is "disturbing," the Vornado/Durst bid is "slightly less disturbing." The "only one worth serious consideration" is Extell's proposal (right), which didn't fare so well in the people's vote. Interesting. ['In Plans for Railyards, a Mix of Towers and Parks'/Nicolai Ouroussoff]

2) The latest regarding One Madison Park and its increasingly notorious $45 million penthouse. A "European Pritzker Prize-winning architect" will be brought in to design just the 22nd Street entrance (because 23rd Street is yucky) and the penthouse will come with a private butler, paid for by the condominium, who will live in a one-bedroom unit on a lower floor. There is a debate going on about whether or not that is possible, however. You know Tim Robbins ain't gonna be pleased about paying for somebody else's manservant. [Big Deal/Josh Barbanel]

3) Joyce Cohen finally figured out who would buy in the Simone in Windsor Terrace, a building that immediately puts you one foot in the grave upon purchase: people whose only other option is the Bronx. Makes sense. [The Hunt/Joyce Cohen]

It was too good to be true. The proposed hotel addition to the landmark Battery Maritime Building—a glassy mindfuck first revealed in this space on Monday—has been sent back to the drawing board by the Landmarks Preservation Commission, the Downtown Express reports. The LPC didn't vote on the Rogers Marvel Architects proposal, instead asking for more elements of the building's original architecture to be incorporated into the design. Developer Peter Poulakakos shrugged it off like it was no big deal, saying, "No one expected this thing to be approved off the bat. We have an aggressive timeline; hopefully, we can have this project complete by 2010.” This is perhaps a very cunning strategy on Poulakakos' part: propose something that's 10,000 types of crazy, then your real proposal—which is perhaps only 5,000 types of crazy—will sail through undetected.
· Landmarks asks for changes to Battery’s hotel design [Downtown Express]
· Battery Maritime Building Renovation Revealed [Curbed]
· Battery Maritime Building: Gourmet Marketplace Confirmed! [Curbed]

Ho. Ly. Crap. Behold, the Economic Development Corporation's vision for the $110 million makeover of the painstakingly restored Battery Maritime Building! While the details of the plan have not been a secret—gourmet food market, 135-room boutique hotel and a rooftop restaurant with a view to kill for—the future look of the landmark has been kept under wraps until now. A special Curbed tipster spotted this poster-size rendering at the Landmark Preservation Commission's public review, and she somehow managed to snap a shot of it before her brain exploded. She writes: "After all that great restoration work EDC is proposing a 'rooftop addition' to the Battery Maritime Building. It's about 5 stories (full-width) of glass for a hotel." As for if this extension will actually get built, that's up to the LPC to decide. The building is on the commission's docket for tomorrow morning's public hearing. Developing!
· Battery Maritime Building: Gourmet Marketplace Confirmed! [Curbed]
· Battery Maritime Building: Manhattan's Pike Place? [Curbed]

At last, plans for the rejuvenation of the long-crumbling-but-still- totally-gorgeous Battery Maritime Building have become clear. More than a year after requests for development proposals went out—and while restoration of the facade has finished—comes the news that the Dermot Company and the Poulakakos Family will develop the project. What's on tap? A $110 million makeover that'll bring a gourmet food market to the building's waiting room, in the spirit of San Francisco's genius Ferry Building makeover. Terminal offices, meantime, will be converted to a 135-room boutique hotel, and there's going to be a rooftop restaurant, too. Let's file all of this under Extremely Welcome News, even as we await more specifics about the makeover. Next up: build Santiago's Gondolas, already!
· Hotel, Market Slated for Battery Maritime Building [Metro]
· Landmark Maritime Building Hauls in Gourmet Marketplace [Grub Street]
· Battery Maritime Building: Manhattan's Pike Place? [Curbed]