Arch
June 23rd, 2003, 02:18 PM
Publication:The New York Sun; Date:Jun 23, 2003; Section:Arts & Letters; Page:14
ARCHITECTURE
The Best Building in Years
By JAMES GARDNER
Can it be that 360 Madison Avenue, which seems to have sprung up out of nowhere on the northwest corner of 45 th Street, is the best new building in Midtown in over a generation? Very possibly. Given the competition, of course, that doesn’t sound like much. And yet, by any objective estimate, it is such a fine-looking structure that it almost doesn’t belong in New York. In fact, it may even be better than we deserve.
In some incalculable way, great cities tend to generate buildings that are unique to them, even when the buildings resemble those of other cities. Consider our Modernist office towers. Given that New York is universally recognized as the Modern city par excellence, isn’t it odd that so many of them should be so bad and bad in the same way and for the same reasons? With a few eminent exceptions, they invoke the inventions of genius but without courage, conviction, imagination, or taste. Whatever specific form a Midtown office building might take — even if a few postmodern flourishes are added to its essentially Modernist structure — the result is almost invariably some drab variation on an all-too common theme. Indeed, if you don’t travel much, you could be excused for thinking that that dreary sameness was the fault of Modernism itself.
And yet, go to almost any other large city in the world, whether Brisbane, Lima, London, or Miami, and you will notice two things about its latest architecture: Not only is it almost always better than New York’s, but it feels lighter, brighter, bouncier, and more inventive. That is the respect in which 360 Madison feels so fresh as to seem like a revelation. Only compare it to the three or four losers that are currently under construction on Madison from 41 st to 44 th Streets, and you will see what I mean. It almost feels like a building that had been lifted bodily from some other city, perhaps some other country.
Designed by Richard Cook and Associates (which has just changed its name to Cook + Fox), with Serge Appel as project architect, 360 Madison Avenue is a massive glass box that, though legible in purely Modernist terms, displays subtle elements of postmodern contextualism. Buried deep within it lies the ghost of Abercrombie & Fitch, the department store that once occupied the site. As though in tribute to it and to those brick buildings (like Fred French up the street) that predominate in this part of Midtown, its base has horizontal metal mullions that distinguish it from the vertical orientation of the building’s upper levels. There are also intimations of a cornice at various points.The general massing, with shifting planes that result in part from the obligation to assimilate and build around the steel frame of the old Abercrombie & Fitch, evokes the blockishness of early 20 th-century New York.
Still, the overwhelming impression of the structure is one of mainstream Modernism, distinguished less by any strident idiom than by the consistent skill with which each part has been designed and carried out. Seen through the lacustrine clarity of its glass curtain wall, the internal space acquires the fluid, liquid purity of spring water.This purity is enhanced with rare subtlety by quarter-inch white mullions that hold the glass panels in place. So fine are the resulting lines that the eye immediately appreciates the overwhelming sense of restrained opulence, the sense that neither time nor money was spared to create the best possible product. The mullion lines, in turn, are bracketed at intervals by slightly broader regulating lines that, seen from a distance, seem to etherealize the entire structure into pure geometry.
Inside you will find one of the most tranquil lobbies in the city. Its dominant color is the rich gray of its exposed concrete shear wall, left entirely bare in one of the most tasteful and audacious tributes to the inherent beauty of this material since Louis Kahn’s Salk Institute in La Jolla, Calif. Its sandblasted gray is softened by the blond tones of English sycamore behind the security desk, by the hand-waxed plaster of the adjoining walls, and by lamps, resembling votive candles, that descend from the lofty ceiling on long rods. The corners of each wall, as well as the door and elevator surrounds, are accented with statuary bronze.The entire space unfolds with such skill that, even though the perspective shifts several times, each unfolding vista is perfect in itself. A case in point is the three-lamp configuration that faces you against a bare wall as you look out from the elevator banks.
To understand immediately how rare a piece of work is 360 Madison Avenue, consider an alarming admission from Larry Silverstein, leaseholder of the World Trade Center site, in a recent issue of the New York Times. Now, whatever one thinks of Daniel Libeskind’s design, no one can deny that it is artsy and high-concept, which in itself is a relief from the usual fare of the financial district. It turns out, however, that Mr. Silverstein wants Mr. Libeskind to design as little as possible, even though he says the tower that he does build "will reflect the spirit of Dan’s site plan … and the architect [who is ultimately chosen] will draw from and be inspired by Dan’s portrayal." In other words, Mr. Libeskind is probably not going near any of the actual buildings. You can sense more than a little nervousness in Mr. Libeskind’s statement that, "I’ve been assured by Larry, whom I like, that I’ll be meaningfully involved in the design of the building."
The overwhelming impression left by the Times article was one of macabre inevitability as regards the man whom Mr. Silverstein seems most to favor: David Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. If ever there was a usual suspect, it is SOM in general and Mr. Childs in specific.Though they more or less invented Midtown Modernism back in the 1950s, under the brilliant direction of Gordon Bunshaft, they have been resting on their laurels for well over a generation, and it is not clear that, in all that time, they have turned out a single building that was better than adequate. They, more than anyone, are responsible for the Boring Modern Office Building of recent years, to which 360 Madison Avenue stands in such refreshing contrast. A perfect example is Mr. Childs’s design for 7 World Trade Center, which received Mr. Silverstein’s enthusiastic sanction back in November.
The resurgence of SOM and Mr. Childs, who were responsible last December for the least distinguished of the nine proposals for the WTC, brings to mind the sort of fear film in which, in the closing moments, just when you think order and goodness have been restored, a green arm rises out of the grave to wreak more evil. Wasn’t SOM the sort of firm that we would not be seeing at Ground Zero, because the public, for once, was demanding poetry,drama, beauty? But on the principle that a leopard cannot change its spots, Mr. Silverstein just can’t let go of that general attitude that made Midtown and downtown the miasma that they are.
This fact was made more or less explicit when he admitted that, in choosing someone to design the new buildings, he was now looking at "a relatively small group of architects who have spent their lives designing high-rise office towers."True, he mentioned Renzo Piano,Norman Foster,and a few others. But it is beginning to look as if Mr. Childs is his man and as if he knew it all along. And as for all those airy visions of great architecture arising over Ground Zero, at least they were fun while they lasted.
KONRAD FIEDLER BRIGHT INVENTION 360 Madison Avenue, designed by Cook + Fox (formerly Richard Cook and Associates).
SKIDMORE, OWINGS & MERRILL DULL CONVENTION Rendering of 7 World Trade Center.
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ARCHITECTURE
The Best Building in Years
By JAMES GARDNER
Can it be that 360 Madison Avenue, which seems to have sprung up out of nowhere on the northwest corner of 45 th Street, is the best new building in Midtown in over a generation? Very possibly. Given the competition, of course, that doesn’t sound like much. And yet, by any objective estimate, it is such a fine-looking structure that it almost doesn’t belong in New York. In fact, it may even be better than we deserve.
In some incalculable way, great cities tend to generate buildings that are unique to them, even when the buildings resemble those of other cities. Consider our Modernist office towers. Given that New York is universally recognized as the Modern city par excellence, isn’t it odd that so many of them should be so bad and bad in the same way and for the same reasons? With a few eminent exceptions, they invoke the inventions of genius but without courage, conviction, imagination, or taste. Whatever specific form a Midtown office building might take — even if a few postmodern flourishes are added to its essentially Modernist structure — the result is almost invariably some drab variation on an all-too common theme. Indeed, if you don’t travel much, you could be excused for thinking that that dreary sameness was the fault of Modernism itself.
And yet, go to almost any other large city in the world, whether Brisbane, Lima, London, or Miami, and you will notice two things about its latest architecture: Not only is it almost always better than New York’s, but it feels lighter, brighter, bouncier, and more inventive. That is the respect in which 360 Madison feels so fresh as to seem like a revelation. Only compare it to the three or four losers that are currently under construction on Madison from 41 st to 44 th Streets, and you will see what I mean. It almost feels like a building that had been lifted bodily from some other city, perhaps some other country.
Designed by Richard Cook and Associates (which has just changed its name to Cook + Fox), with Serge Appel as project architect, 360 Madison Avenue is a massive glass box that, though legible in purely Modernist terms, displays subtle elements of postmodern contextualism. Buried deep within it lies the ghost of Abercrombie & Fitch, the department store that once occupied the site. As though in tribute to it and to those brick buildings (like Fred French up the street) that predominate in this part of Midtown, its base has horizontal metal mullions that distinguish it from the vertical orientation of the building’s upper levels. There are also intimations of a cornice at various points.The general massing, with shifting planes that result in part from the obligation to assimilate and build around the steel frame of the old Abercrombie & Fitch, evokes the blockishness of early 20 th-century New York.
Still, the overwhelming impression of the structure is one of mainstream Modernism, distinguished less by any strident idiom than by the consistent skill with which each part has been designed and carried out. Seen through the lacustrine clarity of its glass curtain wall, the internal space acquires the fluid, liquid purity of spring water.This purity is enhanced with rare subtlety by quarter-inch white mullions that hold the glass panels in place. So fine are the resulting lines that the eye immediately appreciates the overwhelming sense of restrained opulence, the sense that neither time nor money was spared to create the best possible product. The mullion lines, in turn, are bracketed at intervals by slightly broader regulating lines that, seen from a distance, seem to etherealize the entire structure into pure geometry.
Inside you will find one of the most tranquil lobbies in the city. Its dominant color is the rich gray of its exposed concrete shear wall, left entirely bare in one of the most tasteful and audacious tributes to the inherent beauty of this material since Louis Kahn’s Salk Institute in La Jolla, Calif. Its sandblasted gray is softened by the blond tones of English sycamore behind the security desk, by the hand-waxed plaster of the adjoining walls, and by lamps, resembling votive candles, that descend from the lofty ceiling on long rods. The corners of each wall, as well as the door and elevator surrounds, are accented with statuary bronze.The entire space unfolds with such skill that, even though the perspective shifts several times, each unfolding vista is perfect in itself. A case in point is the three-lamp configuration that faces you against a bare wall as you look out from the elevator banks.
To understand immediately how rare a piece of work is 360 Madison Avenue, consider an alarming admission from Larry Silverstein, leaseholder of the World Trade Center site, in a recent issue of the New York Times. Now, whatever one thinks of Daniel Libeskind’s design, no one can deny that it is artsy and high-concept, which in itself is a relief from the usual fare of the financial district. It turns out, however, that Mr. Silverstein wants Mr. Libeskind to design as little as possible, even though he says the tower that he does build "will reflect the spirit of Dan’s site plan … and the architect [who is ultimately chosen] will draw from and be inspired by Dan’s portrayal." In other words, Mr. Libeskind is probably not going near any of the actual buildings. You can sense more than a little nervousness in Mr. Libeskind’s statement that, "I’ve been assured by Larry, whom I like, that I’ll be meaningfully involved in the design of the building."
The overwhelming impression left by the Times article was one of macabre inevitability as regards the man whom Mr. Silverstein seems most to favor: David Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. If ever there was a usual suspect, it is SOM in general and Mr. Childs in specific.Though they more or less invented Midtown Modernism back in the 1950s, under the brilliant direction of Gordon Bunshaft, they have been resting on their laurels for well over a generation, and it is not clear that, in all that time, they have turned out a single building that was better than adequate. They, more than anyone, are responsible for the Boring Modern Office Building of recent years, to which 360 Madison Avenue stands in such refreshing contrast. A perfect example is Mr. Childs’s design for 7 World Trade Center, which received Mr. Silverstein’s enthusiastic sanction back in November.
The resurgence of SOM and Mr. Childs, who were responsible last December for the least distinguished of the nine proposals for the WTC, brings to mind the sort of fear film in which, in the closing moments, just when you think order and goodness have been restored, a green arm rises out of the grave to wreak more evil. Wasn’t SOM the sort of firm that we would not be seeing at Ground Zero, because the public, for once, was demanding poetry,drama, beauty? But on the principle that a leopard cannot change its spots, Mr. Silverstein just can’t let go of that general attitude that made Midtown and downtown the miasma that they are.
This fact was made more or less explicit when he admitted that, in choosing someone to design the new buildings, he was now looking at "a relatively small group of architects who have spent their lives designing high-rise office towers."True, he mentioned Renzo Piano,Norman Foster,and a few others. But it is beginning to look as if Mr. Childs is his man and as if he knew it all along. And as for all those airy visions of great architecture arising over Ground Zero, at least they were fun while they lasted.
KONRAD FIEDLER BRIGHT INVENTION 360 Madison Avenue, designed by Cook + Fox (formerly Richard Cook and Associates).
SKIDMORE, OWINGS & MERRILL DULL CONVENTION Rendering of 7 World Trade Center.
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