111 West 57th Street
111 West 57th Street, also known as Steinway Tower, is a supertall residential skyscraper in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City, New York, U.S. Developed by JDS Development Group and Property Markets Group, it sits on Billionaires' Row on the north side of 57th Street near Sixth Avenue. The main portion of the building is an 84-story, tower designed by SHoP Architects and completed in 2021. Preserved at the base is the 16-story Steinway Building, a former Steinway & Sons store designed by Warren and Wetmore and completed in 1925, which originally carried the address 111 West 57th Street.
111 West 57th Street contains 59 luxury condominiums: 14 in Steinway Hall and 45 in the tower. The residential tower has a glass facade with piers made of terracotta; its pinnacle contains setbacks on the southern side. The tower is the fourth-tallest building in the United States as of November 2022, as well as the thinnest skyscraper in the world with a width-to-height ratio of about 1:24. Steinway Hall is a New York City designated landmark and has a facade made mostly of brick, limestone, and terracotta. 111 West 57th Street contains numerous resident amenities, housed mostly in the building's base, as well as a large rotunda within Steinway Hall that is also a designated city landmark.
The Steinway & Sons store at 111 West 57th Street was proposed in 1916 but was not completed for another nine years due to lawsuits and other delays. Steinway Hall served as a store, recital hall, and office building for almost nine decades, though it was unsuccessful as a speculative development. Plans for a residential skyscraper on the site date to 2005, and JDS acquired the lots for the skyscraper between 2012 and 2013. Despite the tower's size, it was technically constructed as an addition to Steinway Hall. Construction on the tower began in 2014, and Steinway Hall was restored as part of the residential project. The development faced several challenges, including financing difficulties, lawsuits, and controversies over employment. The tower topped out during April 2019 and was finished in 2022.
Site
111 West 57th Street is in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City, New York, U.S. It is located one city block south of Central Park, between Sixth Avenue to the east and Seventh Avenue to the west. The building occupies the land lots at 105–113 West 57th Street and contains frontage along 57th Street to the south and 58th Street to the north. The rectangular site covers, with a frontage of on 57th and 58th Streets, and a depth of between the two streets.111 West 57th Street occupies the same block as the Calvary Baptist Church, One57, and Alwyn Court to the west, and abuts The Quin immediately to the east. 111 West 57th Street is also near Carnegie Hall, Carnegie Hall Tower, and Metropolitan Tower one block west; Parker New York, 130 West 57th Street, and 140 West 57th Street across 57th Street to the south; and Hampshire House and Trump Parc across 58th Street to the north. The building stands across from the 57th Street station of the New York City Subway's. 111 West 57th Street is one of several major developments around 57th Street and Central Park that are collectively dubbed Billionaires' Row by the media. Other buildings along Billionaires' Row include 432 Park Avenue four blocks southeast, 220 Central Park South one block northwest, Central Park Tower one block west, and the nearby One57.
111 West 57th Street's base contains Steinway Hall, a former store and recital hall completed in 1925 for Steinway & Sons. Steinway Hall was designed by Warren & Wetmore and is a New York City designated landmark. Steinway Hall was part of an artistic hub developed around the two blocks of West 57th Street from Sixth Avenue west to Broadway during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, following the opening of Carnegie Hall in 1891. The area contains several buildings constructed as residences for artists and musicians, such as 130 and 140 West 57th Street, the Rodin Studios, and the Osborne Apartments. In addition, the area contained the headquarters of organizations such as the American Fine Arts Society, the Lotos Club, and the American Society of Civil Engineers.
Architecture
111 West 57th Street, also known as Steinway Tower, was developed by Michael Stern's JDS Development Group and Kevin P. Maloney's Property Markets Group. WSP USA was the structural engineer for the project, while Jaros, Baum & Bolles was the engineer in charge of mechanical, electrical, and plumbing.The building has two components. The base of the development contains Warren and Wetmore's Steinway Hall, while rising above it is a tower designed by SHoP Architects. According to documents filed by SHoP Architects principal Gregg Pasquarelli, the roof slab of the tower is above ground level while the pinnacle is above ground. The building contains 84 stories above ground level or 85 including the roof slab. The top story is numbered as floor 91, while floor numbers 5–7, 13, and 21–25 are skipped. The tallest habitable story of the tower is above ground level. There is also a sub-cellar and cellar, used primarily for utilities and storage.
Form
The 16-story, L-shaped Steinway Hall has frontages of along 57th Street and on 58th Street. The concert hall has a setback above the 12th story on 57th Street, and setbacks above the 9th and 12th stories on 58th Street. The 16th story along 57th Street is also set back from all sides. The roof of Steinway Hall contains a campanile with a pyramidal copper roof and lantern, similar to the Mausoleum at Halicarnassus. Christopher Gray of The New York Times described the campanile as having a "sculptural, even funerary, caste".The residential tower atop Steinway Hall occupies a site measuring about across. It is one of the tallest buildings in the United States, as well as the thinnest skyscraper in the world with a width-to-height ratio of about 1:24. Due to its slenderness, the top stories sway several feet during high winds. The building has been characterized as part of a new breed of New York City "pencil towers". The tower's northern elevation rises directly up to the pinnacle, and the southern elevation contains several setbacks as the tower rises, thinning the tower's footprint on higher floors. The pinnacle's lighting pattern was commissioned by L'Observatoire International. Because of the shape of the tower's pinnacle, 111 West 57th Street has been nicknamed the "stairway to heaven".
Facade
Steinway Hall
Steinway Hall's exterior is neoclassical in style. On the first three stories of Steinway Hall's southern elevation, facing 57th Street, the facade is made of Indiana limestone above a pink-granite water table. Two rectangular portals flank a large central arch there. The outer portals contain wooden pocket doors, which are surrounded by moldings and topped with entablatures. The central opening is a display window that contains an entablature supported by Ionic columns on either side, as well as a lunette above the entablature. The lunette has a cement sculptural group by Leo Lentelli, which contains a bas-relief of Apollo. Above the third story is a frieze that has medallions depicting classical composers and pianists, in addition to a plaque.The northern elevation on 58th Street is clad with brick, limestone, and terracotta. The lowest two floors are faced with rusticated limestone blocks; the first floor has loading docks on either end of the 58th Street elevation. One of the 58th Street loading docks led to a freight elevator for Steinway Hall's tenants, while the other led to a freight elevator used specifically by Steinway & Sons.
Steinway Hall's upper stories are clad with brick. On 57th Street, there are three pairs of windows on each of the 4th through 12th stories. On 58th Street, there are five windows on each of the 3rd through 12th stories; there is a balustrade at the third story and a cornice atop the 9th story. Above the 12th story, on both 57th and 58th Streets, is a parapet capped by urns. The western elevation is clad with plain brick and contains some window openings. The 13th through 15th stories of Steinway Hall have chamfered corners and Ionic colonnades, with a parapet above the 15th story. The 16th story has brick piers at each corner, shallow arches on each side, band courses at the bottom, and a cornice at the top.
Tower
The tower's facade was designed by BuroHappold and was inspired by older New York City skyscrapers including the Empire State, Chrysler, and RCA buildings. Within the portion of the ground level not occupied by Steinway Hall, there are doors with aluminum or bronze frames. This section serves as the retail entrance and was included only because zoning rules mandated it. The northern and southern elevations consist of large glass curtain walls. There are bronze mullions between the windows, which project slightly from the glass curtain wall. The top section of the northern elevation, above the highest habitable story, contains reflective glass panels in front of the pinnacle's reinforced concrete walls. There are glass parapets above each setback, and the roof terraces also contain guard rails made of aluminum, bronze, or steel.The eastern and western elevations contain narrow windows between vertical piers of glazed terracotta, which are made of extruded and glazed blocks arranged in a wave-like pattern. Six tones of white were used for the terracotta, which was manufactured in Germany and poured into one of 26 molds. The terracotta piers are meant to be reminiscent of older terracotta designs in New York City, and the beige color complements the limestone facade of Steinway Hall. Each of the terracotta piers rises to the height of one of the setbacks on the pinnacle. There are also bronze mullions, which contain curving patterns resembling bird feathers, between the piers. The piers and mullions help stabilize the tower by creating wind turbulence.