The Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), which opened in 1861, is America’s oldest performing arts center. It was destroyed by fire and replaced in 1908 by the new Academy of Music, now known as the Peter Jay Sharp Building, designed by architects Herts & Tallant.
This historic building was altered in an ad-hoc manner over the years, rendering it disjointed and confusing to patrons. As part of an overall renewal plan, our firm has designed and implemented several significant capital improvements over the past decade to upgrade and enhance audience experience, and create a unified whole including adaptation of the building’s original circulation patterns; creation of the BAMCafé as the primary lobby space; and transformation of the underutilized Helen Carey Playhouse into the four Rose Cinemas.
To complement the improvements that have taken place within, we completed the first major restoration of the building’s exterior, including restoration and replacement of all brickwork and terracotta details; replacement of the building’s cornice (removed more than forty years ago) with one that keeps with the historic design; refurbishment of stained glass windows above the entry doors; and installation of a new handicapped-accessible entrance.
Design of a new, undulating glass canopy completes the façade’s restoration and complements BAM’s historic legacy with contemporary vision.
CLIENT: Brooklyn Academy of Music
COMPLETION: 2012
SIZE: 103,000 square feet
COST: $7.5 million
The City of Newark commissioned H3 to develop a comprehensive master plan for street improvements in Downtown Newark, New Jersey. The team mapped fifty square blocks of street sidewalks, intersections, urban plazas and parks were extensively mapped and developed a plan for phased implementation to complete the project in 24 months.
We focused on substantially upgrading street lighting, improving overall light levels and enhancing safety while reducing glare. Specially shielded metal halide light sources meet dark sky restrictions. Light fixture poles designed in multiple configurations correspond to unique street conditions in the district. A variety of arms, brackets and luminaires efficiently direct light where needed.
To further complement downtown Newark’s mix of historic and contemporary architecture, H3 developed a custom line of street furnishings including benches, bike racks, trash receptacles and signage poles. Each fixture is designed to facilitate maintenance. We incorporated opportunities for branding and advertising into each fixture, to publicize community sponsorships and activities.
Pedestrian and vehicular signs clarify circulation and identify cultural heritage sites. Street signs replaced with large LED-lit signs improve visual clarity. Regulatory and parking restriction signs streamlined to limit confusion reduce sign clutter.
Patterned granite and brick paving at street corners improve pedestrian crossings and handicapped accessibility. A program of street landscaping doubles the number of street trees in the district, while an advanced watering system allows for maintenance of groundcover and seasonal planting.
CLIENT: Newark Downtown District
COMPLETION: 2009
Our staff renovated and expanded two facilities for Middle Country Public Library: the Main Library in Centereach and the Selden Cultural Center. The Selden Cultural Center serves as both a library branch and as a community center with an auditorium and community meeting rooms.
Our needs assessment and planning and programming study identified the need for an addition to the Cultural Center. Documents, plans and images for a referendum were presented and a positive vote by the community took place. Throughout the planning and design phases there was extensive community and library staff interaction.
The expanded building provides a full-service library branch, including a new multi-level reading and stack space; new entry, lobby, and circulation desks; new reading garden; renovated computer classroom and meeting rooms; and an 198-seat auditorium.
The center addresses the community’s needs at all ages. It features a comprehensive homework center for middle-grade and high school students, with a group study room, a tutoring room, and computers, as well as a new 1,400-square-foot teen resource center; It also provides a Family Place, an interactive, drop-in learning space for families and young children including a new early childhood room (ECR). For seniors, the design incorporates a new area, Senior Scene, to meet the needs of senior citizens.
CLIENT: Middle Country Public Library
COMPLETION: 2002
SIZE: 15,000 s.f. existing; 14,000 s.f. addition
COST: $5.3 million
Twenty-five years in the making, Bridgemarket is an innovative adaptive re-use of the landmarked space beneath the Manhattan side of the Queensboro Bridge. It served as a public farmer’s market until the 1930s, when it was taken over by the New York City Department of Transportation and turned into a storage facility. The structure is notable for its 36 tile vaults by the architect Rafael Guastavino, who introduced an adaptation of the Catalan vault to the United States. Bridgemarket is one of his most dramatic public spaces.
Transformation of Bridgemarket re-establishes this structure as one of the city’s great marketplaces. Three commercial tenants—Guastavino’s (a private catering hall), The Conran Shop, and Food Emporium—occupy 98,000 square feet on three levels. On the 59th-Street side, a 3,800-square-foot freestanding glass-and-steel structure serves Conran’s as a small retail space at ground level and as the entrance to the main store, on the lower level.
Just east of this pavilion is a public garden whose focus is the Municipal Art Society’s Blashfield Fountain, which celebrates Evelyn Blashfield, the Society’s founder and a champion of public city spaces.
Restoration included cleaning the bridge, replacing the windows with insulated glass curtainwalls, and replacing all damaged tiles and terracotta details in the vaults.
CLIENT: Bridgemarket Associates
COMPLETION: 2000
SIZE: 98,000SF
COST: $50 Million
Located in Savannah’s Victorian district, the Bull Street Library is the largest facility of the three-county library region. Prior to 1998, the Bull Street branch consisted of three distinctly different buildings: the original neo-classical Carnegie structure built in 1916; a 1936 stack addition; and a 1966 concrete-block addition that doubled its size to 32,500 square-feet.
The Library needed capital improvements including new and expanded services, space for growing collections, incorporation of new technologies and building systems upgrades. Our design more than doubled the existing the library and reconfigured space.
Patrons now enter through the fully accessible original Carnegie entrance. Its interior has been reorganized to house services appropriate to the classically styled spaces. At ground level, the former check-out area has been returned to a sky-lit grand foyer with public meeting spaces and a newly expanded Georgia history department.
The second floor contains the boardroom and administrative offices. New check-out, reference services, expanded public facilities and vertical circulation were added, while all historic spaces were enhanced with new architectural finishes appropriate to the period in which the library was built.
The new, two-story addition is attached to the north facade of the existing library. This wing houses a new children’s reading room on the lower level, adult services on the upper level, and a mezzanine for newspapers and magazines. New landscaping and public spaces integrate the two environments. To be compatible with the Carnegie structure, new construction is clad in cubic blocks of Georgia marble. Extensive fenestration and clerestory windows maximize the use of natural light and provide views of the park and the city.
CLIENT: Live Oak Public Libraries, Savannah
COMPLETION: 2000
SIZE: 66,500 s.f. (including 34,000 s.f. addition)
COST: $6.7 million
As part of the overall renewal of Herald and Greeley Squares, the north and south triangular spaces at the intersection of 34th Street and Broadway, we designed four new park structures to complement the landscape improvements implemented by the 34th Street Partnership.
Constructed of glass and steel, the structures house newsstands and coffee bars, providing an active presence for these well-used public spaces in Midtown. Two of the structures are fully accessible automated public toilets, the only two in operation in New York City.
The structures are designed to be easily maintained and to minimize graffiti. Their canopies become illuminated lanterns during evening hours, improving the safety and security of the squares.
Based on the design of the structures, a prototype newsstand has been developed and will be installed throughout the district. Six structures are planned for 34th Street at Seventh Avenue and 42nd Street at Sixth Avenue. These structures will enhance the vibrant shopping and tourist experience that surrounds this busy urban crossroads.
CLIENT: 34th Street Partnership
COMPLETION: 2001
COST: $8 million
Just as novels are frequently organized around a series of episodes, the new Columbia Public Library is arranged as a sequence of related architectural incidents that can be enjoyed independently. The new library and its reconfigured parking, form a circular area within the landscaped rectangular city block that the library has occupied since 1968. The building is composed of four distinct geometrical forms that house specific library functions: the conical entrance pavilion, the oblong utility spine, the cylindrical collections area, and the administration rectangle. Each is clad in a different material to signify its individual function and to add to the composition of elements that comprise the entire structure.
The utility spine, visible both outside and inside the building, serves as an anchor for the overall structure. Clad in clay tile, this structure encloses the elevator, stairs, toilets, and mechanical systems. It serves as the link between the public and private functions of the library, grouped to either side of this core and provides access to the building’s three public levels.
Faceted translucent and transparent glazing provides this structure with a vibrant presence during the day as well as at night. The soft glow of the tower is recognizable from various areas of downtown Columbia, emphasized by Albert Paley artworks. Containing 290,000 volumes and disks along with 390 seats, and 66 computer terminals, the granite-clad semi-cylinder enclosing the three levels of the library’s collections conveys a sense of solidity. Light enters through windows at the terminus of every major stack run, as well as through skylights and large roof cutouts.
CLIENT: Daniel Boone Regional Library
COMPLETION: Fall 2002
SIZE: 110,000 square feet
COST: $17 million
Our firm won a design competition for redesign of the United States Toll Plaza at Rainbow Bridge, the most heavily used point of entry on the country’s northern border. The project involved the creation of new inspection and office facilities, a tax and duty-free store, and overall support facilities.
Built in 1941, Rainbow Bridge spans 950 feet and consists of two steel arches, each with 24 sections. Increased annual visitation to the Falls challenged the Bridge’s limited capacity, resulting in long lines of idling vehicles, economic losses for both Canada and the United States, and a negative air-quality assessment. Rather than construct a new bridge, a building program was developed that would modernize, beautify and maximize approaches to the Bridge, allowing this popular point of entry to nearly double its capacity.
Working with agency representatives, we developed a design that encourages the efficient flow of incoming traffic from Canada, while pronouncing the grandeur of the site and the dignity of its purpose. Facilities for the U.S. Customs Service, the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service, and the Niagara Falls Bridge Commission are provided in a 600-foot-long arc of glass and metal that hovers over the toll plaza. The concave facade on the Canadian side reflects the graceful structure of the bridge and welcomes visitors to the United States. Thin, vertical louvers of perforated metal against frit glass pay homage to the sweeping steel arches of the bridge, and offer workers unobstructed views of the plaza below. The convex American facade reflects the more informally arranged adjacent parkland.
Beneath the span of the arc are three base buildings of the same Hamilton Bluestone that forms the ledge of the Falls.
CLIENT: Niagara Falls Bridge Commission
COMPLETION: 1999
SIZE: 67,500 square feet
COST: $30 million
The redesign of New York’s Bryant Park accompanied expansion of the New York Public Library and recaptured a derelict public space. The introduction of amenities, careful interventions in the landscape, and proper maintenance have made the park a safe, tranquil urban oasis.
To draw pedestrian traffic, the design removed unruly hedges and created openings in the central lawn’s balustrade. New entrances and ramps to the north and south were added, and access points were altered to encourage easy visitation.
The park is anchored by four food kiosks and the Bryant Park Grill and Café. The restaurant and café allow patrons to dine inside, outside, and on a roof terrace. These delicate-looking buildings feature lattice pavilions with natural plantings that blend with the landscape.
The kiosks, on the edges of the park, serve both passersby and patrons; loose furniture and tables are offered for quick snacks. Their color scheme, of green and brown, is also meant to blend with natural park hues, and their roofs are ornamented with a central open globe and spire. These modest buildings have become a permanent part of the library’s landscaped perimeter, unanimously approved by the Landmarks Commission and universally praised by visitors.
CLIENT: Bryant Park Restoration Corporation/Ark Restaurants
COMPLETION: 1995
SIZE: 5 Acres (Park), 5,250 square feet (Restaurant), 10,500 square feet (Park Structures)