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ONE57 Will Offer Sweeping Views of Central Park at Steep Prices

By Mary Johnson | February 1, 2012 1:42pm
Architect Christian de Portzamparc said he was inspired by Central Park in designing the building, which will be the tallest residential tower in New York City when it is completed in 2013.
Architect Christian de Portzamparc said he was inspired by Central Park in designing the building, which will be the tallest residential tower in New York City when it is completed in 2013.
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ONE57

MIDTOWN — Meet ONE57, the tallest residential building in New York City.

When it’s completed in 2013, the 90-story building at West 57th Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues will be home to a Park Hyatt Hotel as well as some 95 apartments, many of which offer sprawling views of Central Park. The starting price to secure a home inside ONE57 is $6.375 million.

“I realized we could do a very large and important building with spectacular views of the park,” said Gary Barnett, president of Extell Development Company, the developer for the site, which will surpass the 76-story Frank Gehry building on Spruce Street in size.

“I’m not sure it was necessary to do a building as beautiful as this, but I saw this as an opportunity to do something that would really add something special [to New York City],” he added.

The first 39 floors of ONE57, designed by renowned architect Christian de Portzamparc, will be home to a five-star Park Hyatt Hotel. Floors 39 to 90 will house condominiums that range in size from more than 1,000 square feet to more than 13,500 square feet.

The building’s amenities will include dedicated fitness and yoga studios, a screening room and an on-site pet grooming facility. Inside the individual units, interior designer Thomas Juul-Hansen focused on a modern yet timeless design that aimed to maximize light and space in each unit.

The kitchens and master bathrooms are expansive, Juul-Hansen said, and the number of bedrooms are limited in each apartment to keep each room large and luxurious.

“It was a very difficult task, obviously,” Juul-Hansen said, noting that Barnett and his team were very demanding throughout the design process. “We probably redid the building three or four times to get to where we are. But I think it was certainly worth it.”

The floor plans were so important to the developers that those were designed before de Portzamparc had been selected as the site’s architect and the exterior plan was solidified, Barnett explained.

“We are very, very fussy about floor plans and layouts,” he said. “We basically said, ‘This is the way we want the inside of the building to look … Can you make it beautiful?’”

De Portzamparc said he had never before encountered a situation in which he was designing a building around the floor plans, and at first, it was difficult. But he pulled together several designs—some of which were too expensive for the developers, Barnett noted—until the team finally settled on the shimmering, 1,000-foot tower.

“[De Portzamparc] showed us what a truly great architect could come up with,” Barnett added.

Barnett said the building is currently 30 percent sold. It is expected to open in the second half of 2013.