“Possibly your last chance to own a home on the water in the West Village,” declares Ian Schrager, property owner for 160 Leroy, a Herzog and de Meuron creation headed for Manhattan next year. It’s a bold statement about a bold building that, already 50% sold, will offer 49 unique apartments ranging in price from $2.5 to $25 million and bolster the city’s much-discussed boom in high-end residential development.
Herzog and de Meuron concept; via 160 Leroy
Yesterday, Schrager and the Swiss firm released new renderings that show off the building’s sinuous, elegant curves from both the outside and in. For this particular commission, Herzog and de Meuron took inspiration from Oscar Niemeyer, who famously denounced straight lines and angles, which he considered hard and inflexible, in favor of “free-flowing, sensual curves.” 160 Leroy presents a tactile, seemingly sculpted white concrete façade with diamond-faceted windows that amplify the water’s reflection.
But the perks don’t end there for future residents. An arched entryway opens into a Madison Cox-designed courtyard framed in mahogany with serpentine benches, ivy-covered walls and a 30-foot-tall willow tree. The rest of the building is outfitted in custom furniture and lighting designs by Christian Liaigre and Arnold Chan, respectively, in addition to larch wood floors imported from Scandinavia and Sivec marble countertops from Italy.
What these renderings capture is a glimpse of the Manhattan to come — a glistening metropolis of residences that leaves no element of design overlooked. By 2017, Herzog and de Meuron will have staked its claim in New York’s West Village.