Life is about to get greener for the residents of Manhattan’s Nolita neighborhood.
A new luxury condominium building named 152 Elizabeth Street, also the project's address, is embracing biophilic design on a grand scale. The 32,000-square-foot, seven-story complex, designed by award-winning Japanese architect Tadao Ando and developed by New York City–based firm Sumaida + Khurana, will feature the Empire State’s largest residential green wall.
The wall will measure 55 feet high and 99 feet across, covering the entire southern side of the building. Its foliage was designed in collaboration with landscape architecture firm M. Paul Friedberg and Partners and will comprise seasonal vines in a variety of textures and colors that will change with the seasons, including English Ivy, Boston Ivy, Virginia Creepers, Jasmine Clematis, and Climbing Hydrangeas.
For the building’s design, Ando drew on the principles of natural elements—light, sound, air, and water. He is known for his use of concrete, which will serve as the structure's primary material. The finished product will be filled with floor-to-ceiling glass windows, for sprawling views of the neighborhood. The airport-quality glazing will also reduce the admittance of outside noise into residents' apartments.
Each floor of the mid-rise will be treated as its own custom residence, with half-floor units starting at $5.75 million and full floors at $14.8 million. The penthouse pricing hasn't yet been released. Each of the seven residences is designed with very few walls and doors, to create open floor plans.
The exterior green wall isn’t the building’s only natural element: 152 Elizabeth Street's lobby will feature a floor-to-ceiling water wall with grooved glass panels that will be backlit by diffused natural light, along with a complementary fog and light installation whose appearance will change with the time of day, weather, or season.
This will be Ando's first building designed in New York City. The developers at Sumaida + Khurana seek to bring the world's most-renowned contemporary architects to New York City to design their inaugural buildings, only collaborating with architects who have never built there before.
Ando is the only architect to have been awarded all four of the leading international architecture honor: the Pritzker Prize, the Praemium Imperiale, the Carlsberg Prize, and the Kyoto Prize.
