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Another day, another reveal from Danish wunderkind Bjarke Ingels. This time the starchitect has taken on a project at much-loathed Penn Station, transforming 2 Penn Plaza (the tower directly above the station and Madison Square Garden) from a nondescript, monolithic slab to a shiny, playful tower. The renderings, first spotted by NY Yimby, show a somewhat typical glass mass, but the fun begins above the ground levels, where a wave-like canopy of glass panels ushers people in to a new retail base.
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BIG created two versions of the design, but they’re basically the same, save for the glass color and slight variations in the configuration of the retail base’s facade. Two Penn Plaza encompasses 1.6 million square feet, and though this won’t really change, the reconfiguration of the retail portion will likely free up some space.
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Developer Vornado — who owns roughly nine million square feet around Penn Station worth $5.5 billion, including 2 Penn Plaza — reportedly commissioned BIG for the designs. Over the summer, as 6sqft reported, they “tapped Oslo-based starchitecture firm Snøhetta to handle the overhaul’s master plan, the same architects responsible for the 9/11 Memorial Museum Pavilion and the public plaza in Times Square.” They plan to spend millions on revitalizing the area with new retail space, public plazas, and other infrastructure. More recently, Vornado announced plans to combine 1 and 2 Penn Plaza “into a four-million-plus square foot complex,” according to TRD. At the time, CEO Steve Roth said the first step in this plan would be to “re-skin” 2 Penn Plaza to make it “look like it was built recently.” Seems to be a mission accomplished, though we’re not sure how this will fit into Governor Cuomo’s planned $3 billion overhaul of Penn Station.
[Via NY Yimby]
RELATED:
- Starchitecture Firm Snøhetta Will Design Vornado’s Penn Station Area Overhaul
- Renderings Revealed for Governor Cuomo’s $3B Penn Station Overhaul
- All Bjarke Ingels coverage on 6sqft
All renderings via Bjarke Ingels Group
Image may be NSFW.Clik here to view.
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