Green Design
Century-Old 14 Wall Street Earns 2008 Energy Star Designation from EPA
Regardless of your perspective, it’s critical to keep in mind that the most sustainable of buildings is the existing building, particularly when retrofitted for energy efficiency improvements and other green enhancements. Capstone Equities and The Carlyle Group’s 14 Wall Street- which dates from 1912- recently earned a 2008 Energy Star award. The 37-story tower, which stands along Nassau Street between Wall and Pine, across from the New York Stock Exchange, was designed by Trowbridge & Livingston and was designated as a New York City landmark in 1997. There are now twenty commercial buildings in New York City that have received the Energy Star designation from EPA, including Cass Gilbert’s New York Life Insurance Building at 51 Madison Avenue.
Popularity: 17% [?]
6Aug2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Galapagos Art Space Opens Green Doors in Dumbo
The Galapagos Art Space- formerly of Williamsburg- opened last night at 16 Main Street in Brooklyn. The 10,000-square-foot performing arts space will no longer be hosting rock bands, but expect a mix of theater, cabaret, dance, orchestral music, and puppetry in the coming weeks. Galapagos includes a 1600-square-foot indoor lake that helps cool the space and a major design focus was recycled-content material; 90 percent of steel used in construciton was recycled while poured concrete includes 30 percent recycled material. The project is in the midst of pursuing an unspecified LEED rating; when conferred, it would be the first for any performing arts venue in New York City.
Popularity: 15% [?]
6Aug2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Johnson Hall of Science: LEED Gold at St. Lawrence University
Cambridge, Massachusetts-based design firm KlingStubbins, in cooperation with Croxton Collaborative Architects, has achieved a LEED Gold rating from USGBC for the Johnson Hall of Science at St. Lawrence University; the project is the sixth for which KlingStubbins has earned LEED certification during 2008. The 122,000-square-f0ot building will house the biology and chemistry departments and is St. Lawrence’s first phase of a project which will also call for the construction of an additional 120,000 square feet. The school’s four existing science buildings will be renovated over the next three phases to create additional academic space for physics, math, geology, and computer science. Johnson Hall scored 41 LEED points, is oriented on a north/south axis, and is separated into two interconnected wings in order to provide maximum daylight to interior program spaces.
Popularity: 15% [?]
5Aug2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Green Space Abounds at Mount Hope Community Center in South Bronx
Designed by the Croxton Collaborative Architects, the Mount Hope Community Center in the South Bronx will offer a gymnasium, conference center, computer labs, classrooms and play areas at East 175th Street between Townsend and Walton Avenues when it opens sometime later this summer. The 4-story, 44,000-square-foot project will include a number of sustainable design features, though it does not appear that the project team is pursuing any third-party rating. Landscape contractor Plant Fantasies- a certified WBE (woman-owned business enterprise) is installing three levels of outdoor terrace space, including two green roofs, one of 3600 square feet, the other 900 square feet. The outdoor greenery was designed by Mathews Nielsen Landscape Architects, which specified drought-resistant soil and shrubbery.
Popularity: 16% [?]
5Aug2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
ML: Glass Tower Hall at SUNY Cortland Earns LEED Certified Rating
SUNY Cortland’s Glass Tower Hall dormitory building recently received LEED certification from USGBC. The $12.6 million project was completed back in August of 2005 and is the school’s newest residence hall, housing upper-class and transfer students.The 194-bed dorm includes a bicycle room that’s large enough to store a bike for every student, as well as charging stations for hybrid automobiles. Standard LEED features include efficient HVAC systems, windows, and insulation. The design team, which included Ashley McGraw Architects and Burt Hill Kosar Rittlement Associates, also specified a number of sustainable features for the project’s landscaping, including narrow sidewalks, efficient lighting, and native shrubbery.
Popularity: 16% [?]
4Aug2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Litchfield House: Zero Energy Saltbox in Connecticut
The saltbox is one of the country’s oldest home construction techniques and an excellent example of American colonial architecture. Dating from the 1600s across New England, the saltbox’s shed roof and single story would face north with little to no glass in an effort to deflect winter winds. The two-story side of the design faced south, using large windows to passively collect solar energy. The Litchfield House is an effort to implement the principles of the historical saltbox using modern green building techniques. Perhaps the biggest difference in the Litchfield House from a traditional saltbox is that the house’s large roof faces south instead of north, allowing a rooftop photovoltaic system to collect nearly 13,000 watts of solar power annually.
Popularity: 19% [?]
3Aug2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Your Luxury Amenities May Be Trying to Kill You
Apparently, even if your floors are bamboo and your finishes low-VOC, that luxury condo may be giving you cancer anyway. The cause is that ubiquitous must-have mostly used for holding take-out containers: the granite countertop. “It’s not that all granite is dangerous,” a radon-detection technician was quoted in the New York Times. “But I’ve seen a few that might heat up your Cheerios a little.” Granite, particularly the varieties imported from Brazil and Namibia, can release both radon and radiation, according to reports and analysis by the Department of Health. The radiation/radon claim is fervently denied by the Marble Institute of America, which claims it’s “ludicrous” and perpetuated by competing materials manufacturers and makes of radon-detecting technologies. They have released their own study to refute marble’s danger.
Popularity: 24% [?]
25Jul2008 | Alex Padalka | 4 comments | Continued
Port Authority Releases Renderings for Proposed LEED Gold 20 Times Square
At a meeting held earlier today, the Port Authority unveiled renderings from three firms for 20 Times Square, the 1.3 million-square foot, 42-story LEED (for Core and Shell) Gold tower that Vornado Realty Trust and Ruben Cos. plan to co-develop above the north wing of the agency’s Bus Terminal on 8th Avenue. From left to right in the image, Pelli Clarke Pelli (The Visionaire), Rogers Stirk Harbour & Partners (Tower 3 at the World Trade Center along Greenwich Street), and KPF (Court Square Two, One Jackson Square, and the Beer Belly Building) present three very different visions for the tower, ranging from Pelli’s artistic curtain wall and KPF’s glass box that evokes the Lever House (and Boston Properties’ “redux” on West 55th Street) to Rogers’ series of stacked boxes that is easily the most ambitious of the three concepts.
Popularity: 21% [?]
24Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
New York City’s First Green Firehouse Under Construction in Brooklyn’s Sunset Park
Construction recently began on a $6.8 million, RKT&B-designed firehouse for Engine Company 201 at 5113 Fourth Avenue in Sunset Park. The three-story building features a glass facade and is taking the place of an older, 2-story firehouse structure that was recently razed. The project is one of the first in New York City to be constructed under the Department of Design and Construction’s (”DDC”) Design Excellence Program, which Mayor Bloomberg established back in 2004. Although the project is not seeking a LEED rating, green features do abound, ranging from dual-flush toilets and low-flow water fixtures to a water drain heat recovery system. Occupancy sensors and an 85 percent-efficient, conventional single boiler will contribute to maximize the firehouse’s energy efficiency.
Popularity: 17% [?]
24Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Design Competition Solicits LEED Platinum Proposals for Middle School at Empire-Fulton Ferry State Park
The USGBC’s New York Chapter sponsors an annual Natural Talent Competition through its Emerging Green Builders of New York organization. This year, participants’ charge was to design a LEED Platinum-level arts center and middle school in DUMBO; concepts were required to also include a proposed revitalization of the areas adjacent to and including the Empire-Fulton Ferry State Park’s Tobacco Warehouse, which was originally built in the 1870s as a tobacco customs inspection point along the Brooklyn waterfront. In addition to reaching a projected Platinum rating, entries had to incorporate principles from the New York City’s Green Schools Guide and the NY-CHPS High Performance Schools Guidelines. USGBC-NY will unveil the winners next Wednesday, July 30.
Popularity: 17% [?]
23Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Vivavi Teams With Sheldrake to Open Green Furniture Store at Riverhouse
Josh Dorfman and our friends at Vivavi have teamed with The Sheldrake Organization to open an Eco Pop-Up Store at the developer’s Riverhouse condo in Battery Park City. As you’ll recall, the project is aiming for a LEED Platinum rating and recently earned significant green press after Leonardo Di Caprio purchased an apartment in the 32-story, 264-unit tower. The store, which is a fully-furnished Unit 8D, adjacent to the Riverhouse sales center, is open to the public 7 days a week, and features pieces from 18 different green-minded designers, including Brave Space, Modern Bamboo, and Animavi, as well as a Team 7 dining room and office furnishings from Knu Furniture. Vivavi is calling the Pop-Up Store the first of its kind within a residential building in New York City, and it’s certainly the first to exclusively feature green living products.
Popularity: 20% [?]
23Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Brooklyn’s First Boutique Hotel Goes Green in Boerum Hill
Hersha Hospitality’s Nu Hotel, which opened earlier this month, is Brooklyn’s first boutique hotel. Located at 95 Smith Street, the 93-unit property is Hersha’s third hotel after the Duane Street Hotel in Tribeca and Philly’s Independent. Although it’s unclear whether the hotel will seek any LEED or other third-party green building certification, it does offer various eco-friendly features, ranging from organic bedding to custom furnishings crafted from sustainably harvested and FSC-certified teak wood, as well as cork flooring in each guest room. Hersha is also offering bike rentals and storage for guests that are serious about their carbon footprint.
Popularity: 17% [?]
22Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
7 WTC Tenant to Build 5-Star Green Resort in Bermuda
Scout Real Estate Capital, whose New York City offices are located on the 34th floor of Larry Silverstein’s LEED Gold-certified 7 World Trade Center, announced earlier this week that construction on a 5-star resort hotel in Bermuda’s Southampton Parish should commence in September after local officials approve the firm’s preliminary design plans. Scout has already commenced demolition of the Wyndham Beach Resort (which currently occupies the site) and is recycling reclaimed copper and concrete from the property. The firm intends to seek an unspecified LEED rating for the $300 million project, which should open up sometime in 2011, feature 150 guest rooms, and draw power from an on-site solar array.
Popularity: 17% [?]
22Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued-
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