July 22, 2008
by: Linda G. Miller

In this issue:
· Lincoln Center Programs POPS
· Green Building Eases New Mothers into Parenthood
· Fort Ticonderoga: Silver on Parade
· A Lesson Plan for Designing New York City Schools
· Condo Caters to Adult and Children’s Entertainment
· New Jersey Takes Advantage of Skyline Views


Lincoln Center Programs POPS

The former Harmony Atrium will become a new visitor center for Lincoln Center.

Courtesy Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts

A privately owned public space (POPS) was unveiled at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in a design by Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects for a new visitor center. Formerly known as the Harmony Atrium, it’s between Broadway and Columbus Avenue at 62nd and 63rd Streets. Plans call for transforming the space into a “theatrical garden” for performances and civic events. The redesigned 7,000-square-foot public space will feature a centralized box office, information desk, dynamic media wall, Rosa Mexicano restaurant, and public restrooms. Pentagram design consultancy and Show & Tell Productions, a creative technology company specializing in environmental communications, are also involved in the project. In addition, plans for a new micro-park designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro in association with Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and Planners will include an urban grove at 62nd Street across from the visitor center. The park aims to create a more inviting entrance at the southeast portion of the campus and provide a shaded, quiet place to congregate.


Green Building Eases New Mothers into Parenthood

New Space for Women’s Health.

Lilker Associates Consulting Engineers

Perkins + Will and Lilker Associates Consulting Engineers are designing a new 8,000-square-foot sustainable facility for the New Space for Women’s Health, an independent, stand-alone birthing center to open in 2010. The new center, which is being retrofitted from an existing Midtown parking facility, will provide an environment where midwives, mental health professionals, family educators, among other professionals to offer women and families prenatal and postpartum care, childbirth education, gynecological services, social work, and psychological care. The three-floor building has LEED certification in mind, including high-efficiency heat pumps, sustainable heat recovery systems, low-flow plumbing fixtures, and energy-saving lighting equipped with sensors that reduce interior lighting relative to available natural light.


Fort Ticonderoga: Silver on Parade

Deborah Clarke Mars Education Center.

Tonetti Associates Architects

Sited on Fort Ticonderoga’s central parade ground in the Adirondacks, the Deborah Clarke Mars Education Center is a 16,000-square-foot structure with French-style masonry recreating a secure warehouse built during the French and Indian War and blown up by retreating French troops in 1759. Designed by NYC-based Tonetti Associates Architects, the project is slated to earn LEED Silver certification for a number of green features, including use of locally quarried stone, and a geothermal heating and cooling system that serves the entire building using heat pumps from three deep wells. The education center contains classrooms, galleries, production spaces for mixed-media interviews, museum store, central hall, and what the museum calls “essential mingling spaces.” Research for the project spanned three countries and two continents including Canadian sources at Fortress Louisbourg in Cape Breton, Vieux-Montréal, Québec, and French sources at the coastal fortifications of Normandy and Brittany, as well as sources from the New York Public Library, the New York Historical Society library, and New York State Library in Albany.


A Lesson Plan for Designing New York City Schools

PS/IS 295.

Swanke Hayden Connell Architects

PS/IS 295, a new 88,000-square-foot Pre-K through 8th grade school in Queens Village, has been completed. Designed by Swanke Hayden Connell Architects (SHCA), on behalf of the NYC School Construction Authority, the plan strives to foster a connection between the school and the neighborhood by making major assembly spaces available for community use. Consisting of standardized rectilinear spaces on a highly irregular site, the design aims to reflect both the busy commercial strip of Jamaica Avenue and the adjoining quiet residential neighborhood. The program is organized into a long, four-story volume on Jamaica Avenue. The auditorium and gymnasium slide out from under it to relate to a smaller scale and the south-facing playground. A pre-cast concrete “frieze” of playing children animates the building’s through-lobby, accessible from Jamaica Avenue and the playground. This frieze wraps into the building’s interior and frames the auditorium entrance, where a public art mural resides.


Condo Caters to Adult and Children’s Entertainment

Georgica.

Cetra/Ruddy

Georgica, named after East Hampton Village’s Georgica Pond, is a 20-story, 58-unit, 134,000-square-foot residential tower at East 85th Street and Second Avenue. The Cetra/Ruddy-designed project incorporates a playroom and fitness center. Interior design details will include custom bamboo and glass walls, limestone fireplaces, and a limestone and marble lobby. A landscaped roof deck, by HM White Site Architects, is to accommodate adult and children’s activities with a playground, flowering trees, ornamental grasses, and a natural lawn. Construction is set to be complete in 2009.


New Jersey Takes Advantage of Skyline Views

Vela Townhouses.

Arquitectonica

The Vela Townhouses, a luxury waterfront community in Edgewater, NJ, near the George Washington Bridge, is a 140,000-square-foot development designed by Arquitectonica to take advantage of Manhattan skyline views. Five separate buildings contain 29 townhouses, and eight units comprised of three floors, a cellar, private roof decks, and glass-enclosed solariums. By blending traditional elements, textures, and materials with a contemporary motif, the firm attempted to create a sleek aesthetic. The community also features designs by landscape architect Thomas Balsley Associates, including a waterfront infinity-edge pool. Rosen Global Partners developed the project.

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