BY WINNIE McCROY | Among the many changes coming to Chelsea is the renovation of the historic Pier 57, located at 15th Street at Hudson River Park. Although developer Young Woo & Associates won’t break ground on renovations until this October, they have already begun ramping up the retail and entertainment components of this project to get people accustomed to heading across the highway in search of diversions.
“It is going to be a large, multi-use complex with retail, food, cultural programming, public park space and a lot going on,” said Felice Jiang, of the public relations firm Nadine Johnson & Associates. “We are restoring much of the pier, and we are adding an outdoor venue on the roof, for the Tribeca Film Festival.”
You may more easily recognize Pier 57 as the cool mint-green building at 15th Street that was the former Marine & Aviation center. The 444,000-square-foot structure was built in 1952 on floating concrete caissons in the Hudson River and designed by Emil Praeger — who designed floating piers for Allied landings in World War II. Until 2003, it served as the Hudson Pier Depot for the New York City Transit Authority. (It also gained dubious infamy when it was used during the 2004 Republican National Convention as a police holding pen for protestors, earning it the nickname “Little Guantanamo on the Hudson.”)
“The façade will remain the same,” said Jiang, who noted that while they are restoring and redeveloping the entire pier, “Much of it is landmarked, so the north and south façades will not change very much. We will be restoring a lot of the original structure. We are building on top of the roof to create the public park and extend the promenade, but not too much past its original footprint.”
The structure is built on three underwater caissons, which Jiang said will be used for unique retail opportunities yet to be decided, noting that, “One will be used for staff parking and cargo storage, but we are offering the other underwater spaces to be leased, perhaps as retail space or a gym.”
In 2009, developer Young Woo & Associates won a public Request for Proposal by the Hudson River Park Trust (HRPT), to convert the complex into a cultural hub and creative center. Their plan for Pier 57 includes a cultural program, a large rooftop public park upon which the Tribeca Film Festival will be held, several restaurants, entertainment and flexible retail opportunities via both traditional outlets as well as a marketplace constructed of repurposed shipping containers, or “Incuboxes.” The project will allow for approximately 425,000 square feet of retail, in addition to more than 100,000 square feet of public space.
The shipping container concept is currently being displayed gallery-style, in Josemaría de Churtichaga’s installation, “The Magic Carpet.” This Spanish architect has created an installation of 36 shipping containers suspended from the ceiling in the South Head House of the Pier, with each container hanging 10 feet from the ground. The installation allows for individual containers to be lowered and configured in multiple ways, allowing them to keep a unique space for hosting exhibitions, events and other art installations during the exhibitions’ 18-month tenure.
“The Magic Carpet is a floating ceiling of desires, a waiting answer to your questions, a never ending scenes scenery, a million stories container contained…it needs you, is waiting for you to activate the magic,” said Churtichaga, when describing the installation.
“Just to be clear, the Incuboxes are not the containers we’re using for retail now,” noted Young & Woo’s Director of Business Development Adam Zucker. “They’re a marketing, pre-leasing effort as much as an art installation. We really just wanted to open the doors to Pier 57, because millions of people pass it by and no one knows its beauty. It’s not enough to come into ‘an abandoned warehouse last used by the MTA.’ We had to tell the story, but we don’t want the neighborhood to think that this 16,000 foot section of the Marina is the whole thing.”
Pier 57 is also the site for “Pier Pressure,” a huge indoor mural painted onto the floor by local street artists. Jiang said, “We had a video installation in May, the street artists painting the floor in July, and on Saturdays we celebrate young musicians with a two-hour performance. We will have this unique programming throughout the rest of the summer.”
CITY APPROVES RESTORATION
In April, the New York City Council and the HRPT completed the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP) process for the project, approving the developers to move forward on construction and renovation. The process was led by the HRPT, which serves a role akin to a landlord in this situation. Construction on the project will begin this October, and be completed in the spring of 2015.
“This was a truly collaborative process that wouldn’t have been possible without the sustained support and assistance of our neighbors and local leaders, and the developer’s own creative vision for the pier,” said HRPT President and CEO Madelyn Wils in an April press release.
Wils, who will continue to collaborate with Pier 57 on uses for the space, thanked the New York City Council and Speaker Christine Quinn, Borough President Scott Stringer, Community Board 4 and the City Planning Commission for “recognizing the importance of bringing this historic pier back to life.”
“The project ensures the Hudson River Park Trust will soon see a new, sorely needed source of revenue, which will be used to help improve and maintain the entire park,” said Quinn at the time of the ULURP approval. “The Pier 57 redevelopment plan is a major victory for Manhattan’s west side community.”
Zucker said that the ULURP approval and rezoning process was the culmination of a three-year process of regulatory approvals that involved 27 city, state and federal agencies.
“They approved our plans, and with that approval, we’re allowed to go forward with our proposed plans,” said Zucker. “It was an important milestone and one we used to kick off the public facing side of the project.”
Construction on the project will start imminently, said Zucker, noting that at some point in the near future, there will be a leasing office for Pier 57 businesses. Zucker noted that part of the New York experience is the vibrancy of culture — especially in the amalgam of arts, fashion, design, music and culture that occurs in the Meatpacking District. He hoped that rather than presenting people with a purely retail experience, the combination of all of these components would allow Pier 57 to be part of this unique cultural phenomenon.
Pier 57’s completion will also dovetail nicely with the completion of the first phase of the Hudson Yards development project and the Hudson Park & Boulevard. Together with the extension of the High Line to 34th Street, these projects will effectively transform the area between 14th and 34th Streets, from Tenth Avenue to the Hudson River, into a vibrant new destination.
“We didn’t think too much about Hudson Yards when we were planning this, but I do see a correlation between the Meatpacking District and the High Line, and the expansion of Chelsea with that,” said Jiang. “We are all hoping that as Pier 57 grows, the community will also grow with it.”
Zucker said that Chelsea has not just evolved, but matured, and come into its own. He saw the opening of Pier 57 as a logical extension of that growth, saying that, “With the Chelsea Market, the Meatpacking District really started pushing further west, and we definitely feel like we’ll be not just an extension of this, but an integral part of this neighborhood. Right now, we’re just trying to draw the emotional connection so people will see this as both a neighborhood destination and a place that tourists will want to visit.”
RETAIL OPPORTUNITIES TO BE FOUND AT THE MARINA
According to Jiang, the rehabilitation of the pier and the use of repurposed shipping containers would provide an attractive and affordable retail space for local small business owners.
“The Incubox shopping space with the open shipping containers is going to be at much better rates versus other stores in the Meatpacking District,” said Jiang. “Leasing for those will also be different. It will be easier to put your foot in the door for just a couple of months, as opposed to traditional retail spaces. But we will also have those, and hope larger brands will take a part in this project. It should be very cool.”
Zucker said that this availability would be more than just a matter of pricing. A portion of the Incuboxes have been reserved for small business owners, both local and international. The leasing process and terms of the overall property management and tenancy have been designed to take the stress off small business start-ups and make it accessible by cutting out the brokers, attorneys, accountants, business loans and “a lot of the headaches that deter the creative class from coming to market.”
“We believe New York has become too commercialized, and there is a yearning to return to the artisanal,” said Zucker. “We strongly believe the future of retail is a return to the marketplace, of experiential retail, interacting not only with the owner but the brand, but of getting off the computers and back into the shopping realm.”
And even before the project is completed, those involved are eager to make Pier 57 a destination for locals and tourists alike. To that end, they are hosting entertainers in the fields of fashion, music and art. In what they call “a taste of things to come,” they have also opened retail outlets for Fletcher’s Brooklyn Barbecue, Van Leeuwen Ice Cream, Cold Process Coffee, Takumi Tacos, Soludos, Tiny Empire and North Brooklyn Collective.
Zucker celebrated the small retail aspect of the project as an “opportunity to interact with and spot up-and-coming talent.” But he also admitted it was a bit of a teaser for some of the grandeur that is to come.
“The fact that we got this far is a testament to our vision,” said Zucker. “We are using it to pre-lease the project, and to speak to the targeted key partners we’d want in this building. I can’t name names, but I can say that we are speaking to a very prominent hospitality operator, a strong multi-brand fashion tenant and a very authentic New York restaurateur.”
ARTISTS SHOWCASE MUSIC, VISUAL ART
In an effort to get people accustomed to seeing shows at Pier 57, New York City artists have come together to create the group NYCFiveHundred. They hope to spread inspiration through collective sharing of ideas.
This exchange has manifested itself in a showcase of musical and visual art called 9/FiveHundred, a series held every Saturday through August 24 at Pier 57. Each night will be broken up into two hours of performance, and an hour of mingling and networking. Upcoming artists include visual artists Kim Alban and George Tsourounakis, songwriter Candace Lee Camacho and opera vocalist David Cronin.
“The hook would be the programming we’ve been doing all summer to get people used to crossing the highway and going into this space to see how beautiful it is,” said Jiang. “We’ve had food and retail venders in the open shipping containers, from the juice bar to the BBQ place. We’ve had innovative arts, fashion, food and unique programming. We really want people to get out there and get a taste of what Pier 57 will eventually be like.”
— For more information, visit p57nyc.com.
