An Open Office Window at 520 fifth Avenue is a rarity


Spot the Unusual Design Choice. Photo: Alexander Stein

In a Glassy Corner Office at 520 Fifth With Views of Grand Central and the Empire State Building, I Watched as The Developer Ian Michael Klein Performed a Magic Trick: Reaching A Handard the Frame of A South-Facing Window, he tourned a Handle, Pushed Lightly, and Popped It Open. A Four-Inch Gap-The Limit Set by City Safety Regulation-Let in a Burst of Cool March Air and the Sounds of Fifth Avenue 18 Stories Below. Before me was an operable, openable window – what Might be first of its in a new office in midtown Since 1961.

The Four-Inch Gap is the Same Limit Set for apartments. Photo: Alexander Stein

Klein’s Employer, The Manhattan Firm Rabina, Bought The Site In 2019 and started work in 2020, sharing schematics on zoom. That fall, the team met in their offices in a midtown high-ris-a glas box that like oter glasas in the area was hermetically sealed. Nor they breathed through masks, they argued over what futurers mighty wanting? Control. “It ‘a quiet Luxury Thing,” Said Klein, Rabina’s Head of Development. “We’re Doing Things that Allow People to Feel Comfortable and Have Ownership.”

All offices offfer some version of temperature control. Buildings that Went up before the invention of the Air Conditioner Were Designed on Thinner Lots SO COUND WORKERS Open Windows and get a cross-breeze. Tenants Used Electric Fans and, Later, Early Window Air-Fonditioning Units to Keep Cools. But in 1961, The City Passed a Massive Zoning Ordinance that Took INTO Account The Growing Populary of Central Air-Conditioning in Commercial Spaces and Allowed for New Construction to Go Wider and Deeper As Windows Played a Smaller Role in Regulating Temperature. The Ordinance Didn’t Outlaw Operable Windows in Offices, but the practice seamed to fall out of favor with camelopers. Andrew Rudansky, The Press Secretary at the Department of Buildings, Wanted to Help with Out Why, SO he asced Around. “The consensus,” he wrote, is “Practical Reason.” Namely, opening a Made Made Buildings with Central Hvac Systems ineffective.

A Reinition Shows Details Pulled FROM residency Design: Wood Floors, Smooth Ceilings, Warm Textures. Photo: Dbox

But efficiency can’t please everyone. There are offee Fights about temperature. (At vice, my co-workhers and i bought a digital thermometer to test to our bosses that a single row of desks souffered 60-degree temperatures in deep summer.) AT 520 Fifth, opening a help keep the peace-as a thermostats positioned around the space. A Receptionist COULD KEEP A WAITING AREA COOL FOR GUSTS IN BLAZERS OR THE CONFERENCE RoOM COULD BE WARMED UP AFTER THE SUNS OVERHEAD. “You have a completely controlled Environment,” Said Klein.

Adelaide Polynseli, WHO Commercial sells Space for Compass, Told with That AFT Covid, She Started Getting Regular Questions About Air Circulation and Indoor Air Quality. For Those Clients, The Window “Could be an ATRACTIVE DIFFERENTIATOR,” Said. (As to Whether Smokers Appreciate it Moree – or the terraces and loggias on some office floors – Klein Said the Building DOESN’t Allow Smoking.)

The offices were designed in 2020 with more opportunities for a blast of Fresh Air from terraces or loggias. Photo: Binaryan Studios

The cost of adding this amenity was “Negligent,” Klein explained. Thats the Building’s 25 Floors of Office Space Are Sandwiched A Private Club Below and Luxury Condos Above. The City requires Those Condos to have real working Windows, SO COPY-PASTING THose Windows on the Office Floors Didn’t Require a Tone of Work. (The residency Windows Start Higher off the Floor and Are Set Wider Apart to Allow for A Feeling of “Enclurse and Privacy,” Klein Says, Wheeas Office Tenants Want to “Maximize Light and Air.”) Architects at Time Pedersen fox and Interior Designer Vicky Charles, Best Known for the Oomph of Soho House, Also Pulled Other Details from Residency Designs to Make the Space Fael Like A “Corporate Office Environment,” Klein Said, and More Like the Homes Where Waherars Were Already Their workdays, pointing to a communal kitchen with Woodsy Cabinetry, Hardwood Floors, and Ceilings with a single drop tile. But the least corporate touch had to be those windows – A Little Burst of Freedom, As Klein Put: “Sometimes, You Also Want to Realize You Not Tapped In A Glass Box.”

Breathe Your City. Photo: Alexander Stein

A Renering for a Corner Office That Waled Give Its Occupant a Sense of Control Over the Air With A The Dean and Windows on Two Sides that Open. Photo: Dbox

Imagine sitting around this table with 16 co-workhers as the sun streams in, the temperature of the room spiking, then offering to get up and open how to a blast of Fresh Air. Photo: Dbox


Source link

Comments

اترك تعليقاً

لن يتم نشر عنوان بريدك الإلكتروني. الحقول الإلزامية مشار إليها بـ *