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Post 1: Where does the garage fit in the design world?
Post 3: Who Knew?
A conversation with Annabelle Selldorf
One of the most exceptional—and controversial—garage designs in the U.S. lies within the forthcoming 200 Eleventh Avenue condominium in Manhattan, designed by Selldorf Architects. Here, apartment owners will be able to drive into an elevator and arrive at a private garage on their floor—even if it's the penthouse.
In an exclusive interview, AD recently spoke to Annabelle Selldorf, principal architect, about New York's first En-Suite GarageTM. The backstory is fascinating...
Q: Why did you reject a conventional garage for this project?
A: This particular corner of Chelsea is very close to the Hudson River, which would have made it costly and difficult to create an underground garage. The building lot itself is small, so the turning radiuses required for parking would have been difficult to achieve. We looked at using the ground floor and first upper floors for parking and found that too much space would have to be dedicated to circulation. Relatively speaking, the amount of parking spaces would have called for several floors, which is unattractive and undesirable.
Q: Were you aware of the Chelsea warehouse buildings that have truck elevators internally?
A: Yes, they're relatively common. The DIA building had the most beautiful elevator, which I admired as a spatial condition ever since I was a young architect. And the 200 Eleventh Avenue developer likes to think of following Martha Stewart around as she drives her car into the Starrett-Leigh building.
For zoning regulations, in the vertical arrangement, you have give up that amount of square footage—you have to pay for it, so to speak; in the horizontal configuration, it's not counted. Building vertically is always expensive, and the elevator is costly. Also, all of the safety precautions that need to be met: triple fire-rated, impact-resistant—considerations that make construction expensive.
Q: What surprised you about the process?
A: That it freaks people out when they haven't seen any such thing before. The community was all up in arms.
I was also surprised the city discourages parking in this neighborhood. The area is changing rapidly, much as a result of new zoning regulations allowing developers to build tall residential buildings, but there's no infrastructure to support that. No parking, no public transportation, it's lacking in shopping facilities. However, it's sort of a frontier, and a number of good architects have been able to make projects there. It's becoming a viable, attractive, interesting neighborhood, and parking is not what the city wants there.
Q: Why do you think the city government overrode community opposition?
A: The city was supportive of our project from an architectural point of view, because there's innovative design and the few parking spots we provide are insignificant in the scheme of things for the city's consideration. Normally, they consider an approval for a garage with hundreds of parking spaces; our measly 14 that we asked for in addition to the three we were granted anyway simply didn't matter.
Q: Having the living space conjoined with a vehicle with an internal combustion engine, up in the air, is at odds with, let's say, a Feng Shui approach to living, to say the least.
A: I'm not so sure that's true. Whether you have the car on your floor, or whether you drive for 15 minutes looking for a parking spot—is it so different?
Q: The question is really about having the object with the engine, the fuel tank, and so on, driven in the outside elements, lying there in the sky, next to one's living room.
A: That's a poetic interpretation. After all, your gas-fired hot water boiler is sleeping right next to you. I don't see much difference, really. If anything, this is a suburban condition we've created in an urban environment, because it is no different than your regular one-story bungalow with a garage attached.
Q: So they drive into a box, which is the elevator, and it takes them to their floor, and they drive out into their garage. Do they leave the car running in the lift?
A: You turn it off, and go up.
Q: In Japan they have vertical conveyer belt garages—very hypnotic.
A: Fantastic, they're so beautiful. Absolutely hypnotic. The passenger elevators were once like that—an endless loop—you had to step in when the cabin was at your floor. If you hesitated, it could be serious. They were outlawed.
Q: Do you think owners will customize their garage spaces on their floor?
A: I do. I think everybody will do something different. Some of the spaces are very high, so you can install racks with your canoes and skis and so on. Other people could turn it into a music room. Of course, you don't have to use it as a garage if you don't want to.
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