Green Real Estate
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: 1% [?]
24Jul2008 | 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: 5% [?]
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: 5% [?]
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: 6% [?]
22Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Upper West Side’s First Green Condo Complete on 72nd Street
We’ve written previously about the Harsen House; the 16-story, 22-unit project at 120 West 72nd Street broke ground in late 2006 and developer Anbau Enterprises sold the project out within a scant seven months. The building was designed by BKSK Architects (designers of the Queens Botanical Garden Visitor’s Center, which recently earned Gotham’s first LEED Platinum rating) with interiors by Andres Escobar. Green design elements include hot water radiant heat, FSC-certified oak floors, ducted kitchen hoods which ventilate air directly outdoors, and energy-efficient, floor to ceiling windows. Anbau recently announced that it has completed the 60,000-square-foot project after inking retail heavyweight Sleepy’s (The Mattress Professionals) to a long-term lease for the Harsen House’s 4000-square-foot ground-floor retail space.
Popularity: 7% [?]
21Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
NBBJ Earns Manhattan’s Ninth LEED-CI Rating at 2 Rector Street
Global architecture firm NBBJ recently earned a LEED Silver rating from USGBC for its new New York City offices at 2 Rector Street downtown. The space is the ninth in Manhattan to cop a LEED for Commercial Interiors rating, and joins a number of other design professional spaces that have earned the designation. Three of NBBJ’s five U.S. offices have now earned LEED certification; the firm’s offices downtown occupy 15,917 square feet across the 25th floor of the 80-year-old building. The firm spent over five months reconfiguring its space, and signed a 10-year lease that takes advantage of a number of tax incentives offered to businesses relocating to Lower Manhattan. NBBJ principal Timothy Johnson said that the firm “had to solve the puzzle of taking an 80-year-old building with older infrastructure and making it sustainable.”
Popularity: 13% [?]
18Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Newark’s Lincoln Coast Cultural District Set to Open New Jersey’s First Urban LEED Homes
The first mixed-use buildings in an urban location in the state of New Jersey to pursue a LEED rating are set to officially open next week in Newark. The Washington Street Townhomes, which are awaiting a formal LEED Gold rating from USGBC, will consist of six 3800-square-foot buildings, each featuring two residential units with commercial space on the first floor. The development is being spearheaded by the Lincoln Coast Cultural District, a community development corporation which is aiming to develop a comprehensive arts and cultural district in Newark’s Lincoln Park. The district will ultimately boast 11 LEED-certified buildings, as well as seek a LEED for Neighborhood Development (”LEED-ND”) rating.
Popularity: 12% [?]
17Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Law Firm Pays $90 s/f at BXP’s -EB 7 Times Square
The law firm Hiscock & Barclay signed a four-year lease earlier this week for 12,500 square feet of space at Boston Properties’ 7 Times Square (Times Square Tower), which is currently seeking a LEED for Existing Buildings rating from USGBC. The firm is actually subleasing the space from another law firm- Brown Rudnick- and will pay approximately $90 per square foot. The 47-story, David Childs-designed Times Square Tower opened up back in 2004 without an anchor tenant after the Arthur Andersen implosion.
Popularity: 11% [?]
17Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Credit Markets, Lack of Tenants May Trim Vornado’s LEED Silver Harlem Tower
Just before Bon Jovi opened up Saturday night’s All-Star Concert in Central Park, a Major League Baseball rep encouraged the crowd to “tune in” to the new MLB Network once it launches in 2009. Late last week, though, a report surfaced that Vornado, which will develop the $435 million, 21-story Swanke Hayden Connell-designed LEED Silver Harlem Tower at the corner of 125th Street and Park Avenue that’s meant to house the new network, is planning on cutting the building’s size by close to a third due to its inability to secure financing for the project. Vornado has also had difficulty securing any tenants in addition to MLB; the developer had been negotiating with Midtown-based Inner City Broadcasting, the country’s second-largest radio company that targets African-American listeners, but has yet to officially secure a lease with the broadcaster, while a rumored retail lease with Macy’s never materialized either.
Popularity: 14% [?]
14Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 2 comments | Continued
ML: Gold Weeksville Heritage Center by Caples Jefferson Breaks Ground in Bed-Stuy
Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Pamela Green, executive director of the Weeksville Heritage Society, along with other Brooklyn and city leaders, broke ground in a ceremony last Wednesday on a new 19,000-square-foot educational and cultural center at 1698 Bergen Avenue in Bedford-Stuyvesant. The $19.5 million Weeksville Heritage Center, designed by architects Caples Jefferson, will seek a LEED Gold rating from USGBC. Weeksville- now known as Bedford-Stuyvesant- was an African-American community that began in Brooklyn in 1838 as a refuge for slaves fleeing the South.
Popularity: 13% [?]
14Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Green Hotel From Peter Moore Associates Set for Bowery
A new 63-room boutique hotel is slated for construction between Houston and Prince Streets across from the New Museum of Contemporary Art at 250 Bowery. The tower is tentatively scheduled to open in early 2009 after renderings were revealed close to three years ago. Designed and developed by Peter Moore Associates, the hotel will feature a number of green design elements ranging from a green roof and geothermal heating and cooling system to efficient plumbing systems and various renewable and recycled construction materials. The project is expected to seek a LEED Platinum rating. The Bowery hotel would join another planned green downtown boutique- the stalled Greenhouse 26, designed by Arpad Baksa.
Popularity: 17% [?]
10Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued
Law Firm Purchases Manhattan’s “Original” Green Building for $70M
700 Broadway calls itself New York City’s “original” green building; the 10-story, 100,000-square-foot tower dates from 1891 and is the former home of the National Audubon Society, which purchased the building in 1989 while it was abandoned during a much seedier era in the Village. The organization sold the building in 2006 to the Lincoln Property Company for $53 million and (as we wrote about recently) moved earlier this year to the seventh floor of 225 Varick Street. The Audubon Society has outfitted that space with a number of green design features in pursuit of a LEED-CI Platinum rating from USGBC. Oddly enough, a local plaintiffs’ law firm that has likely made millions prosecuting claims arising out of exposure to decidedly non-green building materials such as asbestos and lead paint has purchased 770 Broadway for $70 million.
Popularity: 30% [?]
8Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 2 comments | Continued
Time Warner Center Cops National Building of the Year Honors
Related’s Time Warner Center, which won BOMA’s regional competition for commercial office buildings greater than 1 million square feet back in the spring, has been named The Office Building of the Year (”TOBY”) for 2008-2009 by the Building Owners and Managers Association International in the 1 million-square-foot or greater category. The tower earned the honor at BOMA’s annual conference a couple of weeks ago in Denver and joins 13 other awardees in a number of building types. The international honor comes after the Time Warner Center won at both the local and regional level.
Popularity: 17% [?]
7Jul2008 | Stephen Del Percio | 0 comments | Continued-
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