Lycée Français and DoubleClick on IDA’s July Calendar

July public hearing notice lists $143 million in bond offerings and six straight leases. The New York City Industrial Development Agency, a component of the Economic Development Agency, held its monthly public hearing on July 19, 2007. The 14 project applications detailed in IDA’s public notice included over $143 million in bond offering and six straight leases.

The largest bond application on the July calendar was made by the Lycée Français de New York, an … <Read More>


Piano factory designated after new owner purchased

Landmarks unanimously designated the 1886 piano factory. On February 27, 2007, Landmarks voted to designate the Sohmer Piano Factory in Long Island City, Queens as an individual landmark. The architectural firm of Berger and Baylies designed the factory as well as many of the warehouses and lofts in Tribeca historic districts.

Though not as well known as the nearby Steinway Piano Factory in Astoria, Sohmer was a significant manufacturer in the late nineteenth and early … <Read More>


Architect Lord Norman Foster Talks About His Addition to Madison Avenue

The first addition to New York’s skyline by Pritzker Prize-winning architect Lord Norman Foster opened in October 2006 with a red-carpeted gala attended by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Governor George Pataki and Senator Charles Schumer. The building, Foster’s 42-story diamond-grid steel and glass addition to the Hearst Building, an individual landmark at Eighth Avenue and West 57th Street, won the 2006 Emporis Skyscraper Award, naming it the best skyscraper constructed in the world that year.

Last … <Read More>


Controversial Madison Avenue tower gets hearing

Rendering of the high-rise residential tower proposed at 980 Madison Avenue in the Upper East Side Historic District. mage: LPC.

Public hearing held on 26-story, Norman Foster-designed addition to Madison Ave. building. On October 24, 2006, Landmarks held the first public hearing on the controversial proposal of Aby Rosen and RFR Holdings LLC to add a 26-story addition to the existing five-story building at 980 Madison between East 76th and East 77th Streets in Manhattan’s … <Read More>


Whitney Museum gets variance for addition

Whitney Museum’s programmatic needs warrant variances for height, floor area, and retail space. On July 25, 2006, BSA granted variances to the Whitney Museum of American Art in the Upper East Side Historic District, Manhattan. The additions, including a nine-story, 178-foot Renzo Piano-designed tower required variances for height, setback, floor area, and frontage.

On May 24, 2005, Landmarks approved the museum enlargement and issued a permit on January 5, 2006. 2 CityLand 73 (June 15, … <Read More>


Landmarks nixes two storefront signs

A West Side drugstore and an East Side Dunkin Donuts refused sign approvals. Bernard Weiser, owner of Thomas Drugs located at 179 Columbus Avenue on the Upper West Side, Manhattan, installed without permits an illuminated storefront sign, neon lights, and a fixed awning over the entrance. The store, located in a neo-Grec style flats building, displayed two grandfathered neon signs in the windows that read “Drugs.”

On March 17, 2004, Landmarks issued NOVs to Weiser … <Read More>