Chelsea Garret: Pieced
together from old and new elements and animated by light and shadow, an
industrial penthouse serves as an enticing space for understanding the art of
Alexander Calder.
Like an architectural
therapist, Stephanie Goto stripped away layers of troubles that had weighed on
a trio of rooftop sheds in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood to reveal their
true personality and inner strengths. Added at different times to the roof of
an early-20th-century printing building, the sheds formed a motley set of
ramshackle structures when Goto was hired by the Calder Foundation, which has
offices one floor below, to turn them into a 4,000-square-foot “project space.”
Alexander S.C. Rower, the grandson of the artist Alexander Calder and president
of the foundation, wasn't exactly sure how the space would be used, but was
drawn to the rooftop structures' rugged industrial character and views north to
midtown and the Empire State Building.
“We let the space dictate what should be there,” says Goto, who has designed restaurants such as Corton and collaborated with Tadao Ando on Morimoto, both in New York. When helping Ando with that project, she assisted him in dealings over a proposed Calder Museum in Philadelphia that didn't move forward. Rower met her then.
After removing paint and tar
from skylights and taking down crumbling partitions, Goto exposed the steel
frames of the three sheds, two of which touched each other and one that was
separated by a narrow, enclosed space. “We were pleased to discover the place
had great bones, so we worked with the existing architecture—including the old
bolts and connections,” she says.
In the adjacent middle gallery,
Goto added a clerestory on the south to balance light coming from a restored
one on the north. Although the first two rooms now flow directly into each
other, the flat ceiling and translucent clerestories in the second space imbue
it with a distinct character. In what had been the third shed, Goto replaced
small windows with a wall of tall glass panes that maximizes the view to the
north.
When asked if Calder's art
influenced her design, Goto replies, “Spending so much time at the foundation,
you breathe in Calder. But I never wanted to imitate or mimic his art. Even
with the stair, which is sculptural in character, I didn't want to copy any of
his forms or shapes.”
The unusual facade creates a
sense of mystery, enhanced by a main entry that's clad in the same material and
identified by only a stainless steel pull and a camera above the door. Inside,
visitors can look through the axially aligned galleries all the way to a
rounded steel door reminiscent of those on ships. The door “accentuates the
procession through the galleries,” says Goto, “and hints at a world beyond.”
“We let the space dictate what should be there,” says Goto, who has designed restaurants such as Corton and collaborated with Tadao Ando on Morimoto, both in New York. When helping Ando with that project, she assisted him in dealings over a proposed Calder Museum in Philadelphia that didn't move forward. Rower met her then.
After removing paint and tar
from skylights and taking down crumbling partitions, Goto exposed the steel
frames of the three sheds, two of which touched each other and one that was
separated by a narrow, enclosed space. “We were pleased to discover the place
had great bones, so we worked with the existing architecture—including the old
bolts and connections,” she says.
While creating a cohesive
identity for the New York penthouse, Goto revealed the personality of each of
its three portions. She used daylight to draw visitors through the project, but
made sure each room crafted light in a different way. In the easternmost room,
she repaired angled skylights, replacing old glass with translucent panels to
bathe the space in an even, diffuse light that's particularly good for viewing
Calder's stabiles. “It has the feeling of an artist's garret in Paris,” says
Rower. “My grandfather loved Paris.”
In the adjacent middle gallery,
Goto added a clerestory on the south to balance light coming from a restored
one on the north. Although the first two rooms now flow directly into each
other, the flat ceiling and translucent clerestories in the second space imbue
it with a distinct character. In what had been the third shed, Goto replaced
small windows with a wall of tall glass panes that maximizes the view to the
north.
“We devised a narrative that
pulls you through the project,” says Goto. As the design developed, so did the
program—with Rower seeing how the main spaces could house rotating displays of
art (by Calder and others) and host symposia, performances, and parties. In the
low-ceiling area on the south, Goto designed two workstations with beveled
edges that minimize their profiles. She also tucked a storage space and a
conservation room there.
Figuring out how to use the
narrow space between the second and third sheds proved to be a challenge. After
wrestling with a number of schemes, Goto finally inserted a tight stair
spiraling up to a 115-square-foot room that has a floor-to-ceiling wall of
glass looking south and which Rower uses as his office and a place to think.
Everything in the project is painted white or off-white, but Goto used raw
steel for the stair to provide an animated gray accent.
When asked if Calder's art
influenced her design, Goto replies, “Spending so much time at the foundation,
you breathe in Calder. But I never wanted to imitate or mimic his art. Even
with the stair, which is sculptural in character, I didn't want to copy any of
his forms or shapes.”
For the exterior, Goto looked
for a material that would unify the project. She picked a bead-blasted
stainless steel with an interference coating that makes the metal look blue and
designed a system of triangular panels that create diamond-shaped compositions.
“We wanted a geometry that had no real pattern, so it would tie everything
together,” says Goto. “And we liked the idea of a material that refracts just
blue light, since it echoes our use of light on the inside.”
The unusual facade creates a
sense of mystery, enhanced by a main entry that's clad in the same material and
identified by only a stainless steel pull and a camera above the door. Inside,
visitors can look through the axially aligned galleries all the way to a
rounded steel door reminiscent of those on ships. The door “accentuates the
procession through the galleries,” says Goto, “and hints at a world beyond.”
While expressing its own sense
of craft and design, Goto's architecture embraces Calder's work in a setting
where light, shadow, and movement bring art to life.
Completion
Date: December
2011
Gross
square footage: 4,000
square feet (inside); 3,500 square feet (outside)
Total
construction cost: withheld
Architect: STEPHANIEGOTO
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