TRANSCRIPT

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;05;22

Doug Patt

Let's go inside the vault. The Design Vault.

 

00;00;05;25 - 00;00;20;17

Michelle Wagner

One of the nice things about the site is it's next to the landmark districts. So the heights to the north are low and set, and they won't go any higher. So we knew we wanted to be tall and get as many apartments above that height for views to Manhattan.

 

00;00;20;20 - 00;02;15;29

DP

This is my guest, Michelle Wagner. I'll share more about her shortly. In this episode from the Design Vault we’ll highlight Michelle's project Front and York. Front and York is a 1.2 million square foot mixed use and multi-family complex in Brooklyn, New York. The large scale two tower development occupies an entire city block and encompasses a unique blend of apartments, condos, and luxury penthouses, as well as an unparalleled package of indoor and outdoor amenities, and more than 140,000 square feet of retail.

The project features a blend of more than 750 condo and rental units, as well as an interior courtyard that spans nearly one acre. Not to mention a challenging 25-foot grade change across the site. The building resembles that of a late 19th or early 20th century warehouse or factory, but significantly more luxuriant. With a glass fiber reinforced concrete frame and light gray brick infill, the building is quite beautiful and absolutely massive.

Hi, I'm Doug Pat and this is Design Vault. Today we're talking to Michelle Wagner, registered architect, LEED AP. Michelle has her Bachelor of Environmental Design from the University of Colorado and is a registered architect licensed in New York and Colorado. Michelle is a project director at Morris Adjmi Architects. Before joining Morris Adjmi, Michelle worked on the World Trade Center Master Plan and design guidelines with studio Daniel Libeskind.

With more than 25 years of experience, she excels in the management of large-scale projects and has played a vital role in leading the design and delivery of some of the firm's most ambitious assignments. So, let's get into the details. Welcome, Michelle.

 

00;02;16;03 - 00;02;18;08

MW

Thank you, Doug. Thanks for that introduction.

 

00;02;18;12 - 00;02;26;08

DP

So first, tell us a little bit about Morris Adjmi Architects. Where are they located in New York. What's the size of the firm and what type of work do you do?

 

00;02;26;16 - 00;02;49;29

MW

Sure. We are in lower Manhattan, downtown, really. Right near the stock exchange. It's about a 100 person firm in New York. We also have a small office in New Orleans, about maybe a dozen people now. And that's where Morris grew up, actually. So he still has a home there and family there. And that office covers a lot of our work that's in the South now as we really branched out.

 

00;02;49;29 - 00;02;57;23

MW

We started as a very New York based firm in 1997. Do you want me to go ahead and tell the story of Morris's origin story?

 

00;02;57;24 - 00;02;59;13

DP

Yeah, sure. I'd love to hear it. Absolutely.

 

00;02;59;15 - 00;03;25;27

MW

OK. He was working with Aldo Rossi in Italy. He speaks Italian and he became kind of Aldo Rossi's right hand man in New York when he got the commission of the Scholastic Building in Soho, which you probably know. It's kind of a very modern, but fitting into that historical context very well, right next to the Little Singer building, which is a very famous piece of architecture we all probably learned about an architectural history class.

 

00;03;25;27 - 00;03;36;29

MW

So Aldo was tragically killed in a car accident in the nineties, and Morris finished that project for him and kept the office going and started his office from there.

 

00;03;37;06 - 00;03;39;23

DP

Wow. So what kind of work do you guys do today?

 

00;03;40;00 - 00;04;00;04

MW

We really focused on multifamily, office, hospitality work, our core. We also have art services and interior design, so we really try to deliver all of those services whenever we can. We also have a guy that focuses on urban design, so we've got some multi parcel experience in master planning as well.

 

00;04;00;07 - 00;04;03;21

DP

Wow. So, a comprehensive list of services that you guys offer.

 

00;04;03;24 - 00;04;04;26

MW

Absolutely.

 

00;04;04;29 - 00;04;11;08

DP

So, tell us a little bit about yourself. How did you end up at Morris Adjmi? How long have you been there and what's your role in the office?

 

00;04;11;10 - 00;04;49;02

MW

I came to New York originally to work on the World Trade Center Master Plan with Daniel Libeskind, which - with my husband - which was really supposed to be a six-month contract. And we've been in New York for 20 years now. So that's the way things go. After that, I really enjoyed the experience of working on large scale master planning projects.

So, I went to another firm for a while that focused on master planning and architecture. And then through a friend that I met at that firm, I just heard about this great architect, Morris, and I started to look at the work and I got invited for an interview and that was seven years ago, and I haven't looked back.

 

00;04;49;04 - 00;04;51;06

DP

Oh, that's so great. So, you're clearly enjoying it.

 

00;04;51;06 - 00;04;52;16

MW

Very happy there. Yeah.

 

00;04;52;18 - 00;05;00;12

DP

So, let's dig in here and talk a little bit about our building. Tell us about the Front and York project. So how did your office get the project?

 

00;05;00;14 - 00;05;14;08

MW

It was an invited competition. It was LIVWRK and CIM. There were three or four architects, I think. Bjarke Ingels was one of them... ODA. So, we all had a charrette. It was paid, but you know, not a lot.

 

00;05;14;10 - 00;05;15;13

DP

Sure. Of course.

 

00;05;15;15 - 00;05;28;02

MW

It was a lot of excitement around this competition because it was a big, big block. And you just don't get projects this big in the city very often. So, a lot of effort went in, and we won. So that was great.

 

00;05;28;05 - 00;05;35;20

DP

So just as an aside, are there a lot of competitions like that in New York that firms like yours or firms that are your size try to get?

 

00;05;35;25 - 00;05;51;04

MW

We're often invited to competitions where they've already kind of pre-selected architects and asked to participate. And of course, it's optional if you want to do that, because you know when you're going in for a competition that you're going to put a lot of effort in really to win that project.

 

00;05;51;12 - 00;05;53;16

DP

And how many firms do you usually compete against?

 

00;05;53;22 - 00;06;11;09

MW

We don't always know, honestly. At the time, sometimes it's a blind, so we don't really know. And then we try to find out, with some difficulty. But, you know, three or four small group, I think if it was a large number, we'd be less interested. Yeah, because you got to feel like there's a good chance.

 

00;06;11;11 - 00;06;14;07

DP

That's great. And how long does that process take?

 

00;06;14;13 - 00;06;15;13

MW

Usually, six weeks.

 

00;06;15;22 - 00;06;18;27

DP

So, you have six weeks to complete the project. And then...

 

00;06;18;27 - 00;06;20;00

MW

A concept design.

 

00;06;20;00 - 00;06;29;00

DP

The concept design. Okay. And then they pick somebody. Well, that's going to be challenging to like scheduling projects in the office. Are we going to get this one or are we going to get that one?

 

00;06;29;02 - 00;06;42;16

MW

Oh, yeah. Well, that's a lot of what I do now as a director. A lot of the scheduling. When I worked on Front and York, I was the project manager, so it was really about the project but have been elevated to director. So, it really is more about scheduling and staffing.

 

00;06;42;17 - 00;06;44;17

DP

I bet, with all those people.

 

00;06;44;17 - 00;06;45;05

MW

Yeah.

 

00;06;45;07 - 00;06;54;03

DP

So, tell us a little bit about Front and York. So, tell us some of the history of the location of Front and York and then how did that impact the design?

 

00;06;54;05 - 00;07;03;07

MW

So, the location is a full city block in Dumbo and it was formerly a lead factory and so there was contamination on site.

 

00;07;03;07 - 00;07;04;09

DP

I can only imagine.

 

00;07;04;09 - 00;07;23;12

MW

Yeah. And I think maybe that's why it sat vacant since the eighties. I think maybe it was a private parking lot and fenced for decades. So, you know, it really needed a big development like this to afford to clean off the site because really, we remediated like 50 feet of soils in some areas.

 

00;07;23;12 - 00;07;24;07

DP

50 feet?!

 

00;07;24;09 - 00;07;38;14

MW

Yeah. So, all of the contaminated soils were dealt with, some carted away somewhere, cleaned on the site under supervision of AKRF, our environmental engineer. So, it really took a big project like this to kind of utilize that site.

 

00;07;38;16 - 00;07;41;08

DP

Was the area around the site already well developed or...

 

00;07;41;10 - 00;07;49;01

MW

It was. There were already towers around the site. 100 J Next door was a tall tower. I don't know. It's probably 20 years old at least.

 

00;07;49;04 - 00;07;59;09

DP

So, what were the client's programmatic requirements? You guys won the competition and they said, okay, this is what we need. Or you already knew that because you had entered the earlier competition and won it.

 

00;07;59;11 - 00;08;14;27

MW

Yeah, they came with a residential program, mixed use. They already knew what they wanted the program to be, of course. We weren't sure how we were going to handle the middle of the block because it is an extra-large block. So, some of our early options had a road in the middle.

 

00;08;14;28 - 00;08;15;16

DP

Oh, wow.

 

00;08;15;20 - 00;08;54;17

MW

One thing they really wanted; they wanted cars to be thought of as part of the site. Whether we drove up with a big turnaround in the middle, like the Antwerp, I think it's got a big turnaround in the middle. So, we looked at that. At the end of the day, we decided that the center of the block really should be a park and it would bring the value up for all the interior apartments as well as the street side.

One of the nice things about the site is it's next to the landmark district. So, the heights to the north are low and set and they won't go any higher. So, we knew we wanted to be tall and get as many apartments above that height for views to Manhattan.

 

00;08;54;19 - 00;09;03;02

DP

For those of you who are listening, should take a look at the site plan and the floor plan because it really is quite beautiful with almost like a park-like feature right in the middle.

 

00;09;03;06 - 00;09;22;21

MW

Yeah. As you mentioned, in the beginning, there's a massive park. It's like almost the size of a football field. It's for all the residents. We have a mixture of apartments and condos, front York, but everybody can access the park and even there's a lifetime fitness there as well. And they have some access to that park.

 

00;09;22;26 - 00;09;35;03

DP

Oh wow, that's so great. So, I know there's something unique about the site, right? There's a change in topography. So, when you guys first went out there and looked at that, am I correct, it was 25 feet approximately.

 

00;09;35;08 - 00;09;35;27

MW

About 20.

 

00;09;35;28 - 00;09;47;23

DP

So that's a big deal for a lot. That is as big as this one. You have to start to think about this going to be a really big building. Where do we enter? What floor we entering? How did you guys deal with that?

 

00;09;47;25 - 00;10;09;24

MW

It was a real challenge and of course we had to look at many iterations on how to deal with that. One thing we did know is that we wanted the condo lobbies really to see through to the park, and the condos are sited on opposite corners of the site. So, there's a big grade change from the lobby floors on each corner, like 20 feet.

 

00;10;09;29 - 00;10;24;04

MW

But we wanted to see that park. So, you know, eventually what we came up with was really like rolling hills in the park. I think when you go there, you'll notice it's very kind of hilly and there's a lot of winding path and it feels very organic and natural.

 

00;10;24;08 - 00;10;33;20

DP

Not like a city. So, tell me a little bit about the zoning ordinances there. You said you guys could be taller than buildings that were nearby. How is that even possible? And what were your restrictions.

 

00;10;33;23 - 00;10;57;02

MW

Actually, we are an as of right project. We did not apply for any variances. That was part of the directive from the beginning. We didn't want to wait for that. It can take months to get a ULURP or a zoning amendment here. So, we were as of right. So, we just maximized the floor area and the height limit and really didn't have to get special approvals.

 

00;10;57;04 - 00;10;58;24

DP

Interesting. So that's kind of nice.

 

00;10;59;02 - 00;10;59;22

MW

Yeah.

 

00;10;59;29 - 00;11;05;07

DP

Right? Walk into a project like that. So, tell us a little bit about the building plan. So, it's like a big donut.

 

00;11;05;12 - 00;11;31;16

MW

It's a big donut, yeah. With a large park in the middle, there's sort of a lower podium level that's about eight stories and then on opposite corners there's the towers, which are the condo apartments that are 22 stories tall, and those were sited on diagonal corners and also diagonally from another existing tower in the neighborhood, just to maximize view corridors and make sure that we weren't blocking any view corridor.

 

00;11;31;18 - 00;11;37;06

DP

Did you guys go through a lot of design iterations in terms of where those towers were and how tall the building was?

 

00;11;37;06 - 00;11;38;01

MW

Absolutely.

 

00;11;38;02 - 00;11;38;29

DP

A dumb question!

 

00;11;39;01 - 00;12;07;24

MW

Well, an interesting thing is, though, in our competition, it was similar massing with the two tall towers on the corner, but they told us, okay, that was the competition. Now we're starting over. So, we looked at every possible massing scenario again. And then of course, we ended up back with the towers on the corner. But the big changes, they were more massive. They were bigger towers, more like bars, because they really wanted to have great views in these apartments.

 

00;12;08;01 - 00;12;25;03

DP

So, style, I said in the intro, it looks a little bit like a factory warehouse building. I mean, it does, but it doesn't, right? I mean, it's incredibly stylistic. Talk a little bit about how you chose the particular style because it's a little traditional and it's still contemporary.

 

00;12;25;05 - 00;13;03;23

MW

You know, I think we were inspired by all the factory buildings in Dumbo. I mean, that is the period of significance, that early American factory building, which were very large, and they had big factory windows and were usually brick or masonry.

The storefront, you might notice we have a very tall sort of metal, blue metal storefront, and it looks very muscular, almost like structural steel. It's aluminum, but it looks like structural steel that was really inspired by the Manhattan Bridge, which you can see just down the block from both Front and York. You see the structural steel of the bridge.

 

00;13;03;25 - 00;13;09;05

DP

So, you guys decided from the get go that you were going to make a brick building, right?

 

00;13;09;07 - 00;13;48;22

MW

We did. We always wanted the brick. We actually looked at this building as precast donuts initially, just really a client directive thinking that was going to be the most economical solution. But even as precast, we wanted that gray brick. I mean, we were really trying to kind of fit into the neighborhood. There's a lot of granite, gray cobblestone in Dumbo and it was a big building, so we wanted something a little recessive and quiet, I think, in the brick color. So, we were looking for that dark gray brick, even when it was a precast building, which ultimately, it's not precast. It’s hand-laid Glen-Gery brick.

 

00;13;48;25 - 00;13;53;04

DP

So, what are some of the unique construction details that you guys employed here using brick?

 

00;13;53;25 - 00;14;37;23

MW

Well, the first thing is the brick itself. I mean, we had actually gone pretty far down the road with the precast and had a gray color in mind. But, you know, of course, economics are always a factor. And we couldn't find an economical gray brick that suited us.

So thankfully, we had a great salesperson that told us about, new at the time, custom color Glen-Gery on go clay coating, which is not like a clay coat that's very opaque and solid. It's actually more translucent and we could pick any color that we wanted and it was pretty economical. So that's what we did. We found a beautiful kind of dark, medium gray, very muted, and then a little lighter gray at the penthouse. On the kind of additions on top.

 

00;14;37;26 - 00;14;48;01

DP

And I'm looking at some really beautiful details here, particularly the recess in between that kind of frames out every one of those windows. Was that a detail that you guys spent a lot of time working on?

 

00;14;48;01 - 00;15;04;08

MW

Yes, that was actually a detail that we developed when it was precast donuts. And funny enough, we really liked it because it just gave that little bit of detail to the facade that without it, it felt a little bit flat. So that was originally there to hide the precast joint.

 

00;15;04;08 - 00;15;05;20

DP

Oh my gosh. So, it's a remnant of an earlier design.

 

00;15;05;20 - 00;15;14;01

MW

It's a remnant of an earlier design. I think at one point the client suggested maybe we should take it off. And we all said that we really like it.

 

00;15;14;08 - 00;15;16;15

DP

Yeah, it does an awful lot for the facades.

 

00;15;16;15 - 00;15;23;14

MW

We're going to use it to hide the brick control joint instead. So, that's tucked in there. And that's why you don't see them at the windows.

 

00;15;23;16 - 00;15;25;01

DP

So the control joints are inside.

 

00;15;25;03 - 00;15;26;17

MW

There in that reveal to one side.

 

00;15;26;26 - 00;15;32;05

DP

Oh, I'd love to see a blow-up detail on that. Tell me a little bit about the concrete structural frame.

 

00;15;32;07 - 00;15;34;18

MW

That's the GFRC. The white frame.

 

00;15;34;18 - 00;15;35;19

DP

Yes. Is that structural?

 

00;15;36;08 - 00;15;53;18

MW

Really beautiful. It's not structural, it's trim. This is a concrete building. So yeah, that is a device really to help modulate the scale of the building and also to help it read from a distance. I mean, you can see, actually, you can see that from a plane. I've seen it flying overhead.

 

00;15;53;19 - 00;15;54;22

DP

Are you serious?

 

00;15;54;24 - 00;16;12;15

MW

Yeah, it really does help bring down the scale because, you know, could you imagine if you didn't have that trim? I think the white color, it's really kind of neat standing on Front and York and seeing the blue and white bridge just right there and just kind of the colors just feel good. They fit into the neighborhood. There's white on the bridge.

 

00;16;12;22 - 00;16;17;28

DP

Had you guys looked at doing that in any other color, like gray, having it melt back into the facade?

 

00;16;18;05 - 00;16;34;02

MW

We study everything. We're very iterative, I think in our process. And you - we always internally look at three options. You know, we really push it and then we narrow down the options for the client usually, but lots of options.

 

00;16;34;04 - 00;16;38;08

DP

So, did brick solve any particular design challenges for you guys or for the client?

 

00;16;38;14 - 00;17;10;07

MW

I think the choice to go to brick was just feeling competitively at the time it was cost, but also just the control of knowing that you could go to different masons if you needed to. I think a lot of times there were more than one trade for - I don't know about the brick. I think that was just one mason in the end, but because it was such a big building, they wanted to make sure that there was some duplicity, I guess, of trades being able to work on things. And I think they got nervous about getting all the precast from one place.

 

00;17;10;14 - 00;17;20;17

DP

Did you guys have any challenges finding a good mason? I mean, I would imagine in New York it's not a big deal, but even in a Westchester County where I do a lot of work, we always have a challenge finding good masons.

 

00;17;20;17 - 00;17;35;25

MW

The masons were great. Everybody was great. New Line was the CM, New Line Structures. And we worked on this three years in construction. After three years, it was really hard ending construction because we were kind of a big happy family at that point. It was great.

 

00;17;35;27 - 00;17;44;18

DP

So, into the office I often think about how many people work on a project. How many people were on this team, and how many people did the drawing for the job?

 

00;17;44;25 - 00;17;50;01

MW

I'd say at least 20 at its peak, when we were in construction documents.

 

00;17;50;11 - 00;17;53;07

DP

Yeah. Now, did you guys do this in 3D?

 

00;17;53;10 - 00;18;35;11

MW

Oh, yeah. We did this in Revit. We usually start with Rhino, something very, you know, design-y and flexible and fast. But once you get into Revit, it becomes you're building a building, right. And a computer. So, becomes more cumbersome. But we absolutely did it in Revit. And actually that ended up being tremendously helpful because we use BIM in construction all the way through. That is, New Line did. That's something they like to do and always do. So, they have specialists that can really run Revit and they model in great detail all of the MEP plumbing and electrical systems throughout the building. So, we find clashes in construction on the computer before they ever happen in the field.

 

00;18;35;14 - 00;18;38;01

DP

How long have you guys been on Revit? Just curious.

 

00;18;38;03 - 00;19;04;14

MW

I think we transitioned, probably fully by 2018. When I started in 2016, I think we had one or two projects in Revit. Now we're all Revit. I think we're starting to lose people that know how to work in CAD, but we still have a few. Well, because everybody does Revit. So, we really, we can export to CAD and everything, but we just don't have many people drawing in CAD anymore - and doing the layers.

 

00;19;04;18 - 00;19;13;07

DP

Oh my goodness. Right. That that's how I operate right now. Well, I do both, but I'm on ArchiCAD. Are most of the people in the city on Revit?

 

00;19;13;14 - 00;19;21;15

MW

I think so. I'm sure there are still people working in CAD, but I think more and more people are going to Revit, especially for big projects.

 

00;19;21;18 - 00;19;29;18

DP

So, did sustainability ever come up as a factor in choosing brick, for example, color, texture, thermal, code compliance?

 

00;19;29;21 - 00;20;03;03

MW

This isn't a LEED project, so we didn't consider it for its sustainability, per se. But we did do something at Front and York, which was we qualified for Zone Green, which is a New York City zoning rule, that if you make your exterior wall thicker and heavily insulate it up to 16 inches thick, you actually get a zoning bonus for that. So, we did that. So, these are 16-inch-thick walls with lots of insulation, CMU back up. That's how this is a sustainable project in terms of the brick wall.

 

00;20;03;08 - 00;20;05;20

DP

So, it's an efficient veneer - it's an efficient facade.

 

00;20;05;21 - 00;20;22;21

MW

It's a very, yes, efficient façade. Helps with heating and cooling loads. We also won the Big Apple Brownfield Award for environmental protection for the clean-up effort I mentioned. Yeah, 2020. So, cleaning up that site was a very good move for Dumbo.

 

00;20;22;28 - 00;20;26;20

DP

Just curious, where does all that go? Where does all the land that they've removed...

 

00;20;26;26 - 00;20;38;12

MW

Sometimes they can actually treat it on site. It depends on - they test certain segments like it's a very involved process. If it's very, very bad then there are places out west that will accept it.

 

00;20;38;12 - 00;20;38;28

DP

Okay.

 

00;20;39;01 - 00;20;54;09

MW

If it's not, that can be landfill like for other projects that can be cleaned and kept local. So, the good fill was - actually like people would come, they put a call out and people would come if they needed fill for their construction projects and they'd cart it away.

 

00;20;54;14 - 00;20;59;09

DP

Yeah. Interesting. So, I'm thinking here, do we see any masonry on the interior?

 

00;20;59;13 - 00;21;08;27

MW

We do a little bit up on the eighth floor and amenities. We have some sort of indoor-outdoor fireplaces that have brick. So yeah, there's a little bit.

 

00;21;09;04 - 00;21;18;10

DP

That’s great. So did your team learn anything interesting through the design and construction process, something maybe that you guys hadn't been through in the past?

 

00;21;18;13 - 00;22;15;18

MW

I would say that one thing that we found very difficult at first was the redlining process in architecture, where the more senior architects will redline drawings and then give them to the junior staff to pick up the changes. That was very difficult with a 20-person team. So that kind of prompted us to find a tool which we eventually found Blue Beam Studio, which now we use on every project in the office where you can go in and do group markups together and highlight together. So, it's one document and you refresh the document periodically. So, we had a lot of logistical challenges like that.

We had to set certain meeting pulses internally to make sure we were communicating. So, we weren't overlapping or ignoring a corner of the building, which you can sometimes do, and it's 1.2 million square feet. I think there were a lot of things we learned internally through this process that actually help us now on some of our larger projects.

 

00;22;15;26 - 00;22;18;10

DP

How long was it until you guys implemented Blue Beam?

 

00;22;18;12 - 00;22;25;03

MW

It really like started, I think with Front and York and now the whole office is on it and we really do all of our markups that way.

 

00;22;25;11 - 00;22;26;08

DP

That's really cool.

 

00;22;26;10 - 00;22;34;23

MW

QAQC reviews and Blue Beam’s, probably the new CAD, I would say for a lot of us, because it is a very good markup and measuring tool.

 

00;22;34;29 - 00;22;35;24

DP

Yes.

 

00;22;35;26 - 00;22;39;02

MW

And it's cloud based or it can be. So, you can work in a big group.

 

00;22;39;03 - 00;22;40;26

DP

So, you can go in and draw in 2D.

 

00;22;41;02 - 00;22;41;20

MW

Yep.

 

00;22;41;22 - 00;22;44;21

DP

Wow, that's pretty cool. We've been using Procore.

 

00;22;44;28 - 00;22;50;07

MW

Yeah. We also use Procore. New Line Structures did and that was tremendously helpful.

 

00;22;50;07 - 00;22;53;05

DP

Yeah, for project management, it's been great. Super helpful.

 

00;22;53;09 - 00;23;20;08

MW

Yeah. And just the process of using Navisworks and Revit is basically - Navisworks is the software that helps you look at Revit and really find those clashes in the field. This was the easiest CA project, maybe not easy for all of the staff, but in terms of the leadership, we weren't running into big problems. It was very smooth. We were finding the problems in the model in the field. So that was great.

 

00;23;20;11 - 00;23;25;19

DP

How many drawings does a job like this have? Like what does a construction document set look like?

 

00;23;25;19 - 00;23;27;09

MW

Yeah, I think about 500 drawings.

 

00;23;27;09 - 00;23;28;00

DP

Oh, my goodness gracious.

 

00;23;28;03 - 00;23;31;27

MW

Yeah, something like that. Three or four volumes, you know. Lots of trades.

 

00;23;32;01 - 00;23;34;22

DP

Wow. And construction was three years.

 

00;23;34;25 - 00;23;35;15

MW

That’s about right.

 

00;23;35;20 - 00;23;37;19

DP

Wow. So how long has it been complete?

 

00;23;37;26 - 00;23;44;22

MW

I think it's been complete release since the summer. Last summer? I could be off by a month or two.

 

00;23;44;29 - 00;23;46;26

DP

Are they happy? Is it full?

 

00;23;46;29 - 00;23;53;06

MW

I don't know if it's full, but it's very well occupied. I do know that there's 16 penthouses are all sold.

 

00;23;53;09 - 00;23;54;08

DP

Wow.

 

00;23;54;13 - 00;24;12;23

MW

The views are spectacular all around. So, I think maybe they wish they built more larger apartments because really when this was landing, I mean, seems like the trend started to go to larger apartments. With COVID and everything. A lot of one-bedrooms, but they're really nice sized one-bedrooms, you know.

 

00;24;13;00 - 00;24;13;26

DP

Yeah. The photographs are beautiful.

 

00;24;13;29 - 00;24;28;00

MW

Yeah. And the amenities are - we've had so many developers and other people touring the amenities on the eighth floor. There's 15,000 square feet of amenities up there and they're spectacular. And a couple of swimming pools.

 

00;24;28;03 - 00;24;28;25

DP

Oh, my gosh.

 

00;24;28;26 - 00;24;31;13

MW

On the roof. I think that's a real selling point.

 

00;24;31;15 - 00;24;39;12

DP

So, one last question before you go. Personal question, What's your favorite part of the job and what's your least favorite part of the job as an architect?

 

00;24;39;14 - 00;25;01;17

MW

Well, I like to solve problems with teams. I really like large projects because you get to work with large teams and it's just really fun. We have a lot of people that we have a lunchroom at, at MA and we have people that sit around and do the New York Times crossword puzzle together every day, and we just like solving problems together. So that's my favorite part.

 

00;25;01;24 - 00;25;05;05

DP

Yeah, that's great. You don't have to tell me what you don't like.

 

00;25;05;07 - 00;25;10;04

MW

What I don't like, I think would be obvious, which is the stress and the headaches. And, you know...

 

00;25;10;04 - 00;25;13;09

DP

Yes. I can only imagine on projects that are this big.

 

00;25;13;09 - 00;25;18;24

MW

Right. Running into things that you didn't expect in the field. Those are the things that I like the least.

 

00;25;18;24 - 00;25;23;10

DP

Yeah. My boss used to say, “it's always the thing you don't see coming that gets you.”

 

00;25;23;11 - 00;25;24;03

MW

That's right.

 

00;25;24;03 - 00;25;37;09

DP

It really is. It's not the stuff you worry about all the time. It's the one thing you just never saw coming. Well, Michelle Wagner, thank you very much for your time today. Where can people go to find out more about you and Morris Adjmi Architects?

 

00;25;37;12 - 00;25;40;14

MW

I’d suggest our website, which is ma.com

 

00;25;40;16 - 00;25;50;01

DP

All right. You got it. Well, super simple. And thank you very much. It's been great. Front and York’s gorgeous. Thank you very much.

TRANSCRIPT

00;00;00;02 - 00;00;05;13

Doug Pat (DP)

Let's go inside the vault. The design vault.

 

00;00;05;16 - 00;00;27;11

Tom Loftus (TL)

So we really had to be mindful of availability of product and the budget. So this is what started driving us to start playing with different bonding patterns. If we stack the brick one way versus another way, if we do a running bond versus a stack bond versus a Flemish bond, how can we play around with our stacking patterns and try to make something unique?

 

00;00;27;13 - 00;02;46;23

DP

This is my guest, Tom Loftus. I'll share more about him shortly. In this episode from the Design Vault, we highlight Tom's 389 Weirfield Project in Brooklyn, New York. 389 Weirfield in Brooklyn is a 12 story 50,000 square foot rental project consisting of 66 residential units, a common roof deck, library and cafe. The building was constructed along with a second at 378 Weirfield just across the street.

 

The building features a very unique singular masonry facade we'll discuss today. The sole decorative facade is done in undulating rail like bricks, which is in a creative vertical design. The bricks are dark and called Ebonite Smooth. They protrude in patterns at equally spaced cadence as the facade climbs. The windows are set apart from the vertical masonry bands with frames of varying height, which capture the windows between the horizontal spans. The singular brick facade was a unique way of setting apart a building that might otherwise be much like any other.

 

Hi, I'm Doug Pat and this is Design Vault. Tom Loftus has a bachelor degree in architecture from New York Institute of Technology. He also has a certificate in business management from Cornell University and is a licensed architect in New York.

 

Tom's first exposure to working in the architectural field came from a job in wood frame construction. After a number of years working in Westchester County, he brings over 20 years of project management experience to outgoing architects. As studio director, he has extensive knowledge and experience in project management, schematic design, design, development, construction drawings, design quality and project construction.

 

He's also a leader in building and maintaining client relationships, managing teams’ workloads, plus client and consultant coordination. So welcome, Tom. It's nice to have you with us today. So tell us a little bit about Aufgang Architects in Suffern New York. So where are you guys located in Suffern? What's the size of the firm? How long has it been around and what kind of work do you guys do?

 

00;02;47;01 - 00;03;37;20

TL

Great, first and foremost. Thanks a lot, Doug, for having me on the podcast today. I'm really excited to be here. So we're located here in downtown Suffern, right down the street from the train station pretty close to central Manhattan. So our firm is about 50 people right now. We primarily do residential work. I'd say about 90% of our work is in the residential field.

 

We do everything from low rise to high rise buildings, primarily in the five boroughs. But we also have projects in the tri state area and a few scattered around the country as well. A lot of those projects are mixed use with commercial on the first, second or few floors and then residential apartments above. The residential work that we do ranges in everything from luxury condos all the way to homeless shelters and really a range of everything in between.

 

00;03;37;22 - 00;03;39;28

DP

So how long has Aufgang Architects been around?

 

00;03;40;05 - 00;04;19;22

TL

Outgoing has been around. I think we're going about 50 years now. Ari is the third owner of the company, and when I started, I worked together with Ari and our former principal, Hugo, and they partnered for a while and he had also taken over the firm from someone else. So probably in the early seventies, if I have my history of the firm correct.

 

We started in Rockland County doing small scale residential rehab work and grew in time and in size with our clients and our work type from one partner to the next, and really have kept our foot in our roots in residential and then grown laterally in the industry.

 

00;04;19;25 - 00;04;27;22

DP

Tom, tell us a little bit about yourself. How long have you been practicing architecture and your role as studio director?

 

00;04;27;25 - 00;05;16;29

TL

Sure. It feels like forever. Honestly, every once in a while I wonder, am I still really doing this? But I've been in the architecture field now just a little over 20 years, and I started working in Westchester County. Small scale wood frame, residential. It was a natural stepping stone for me. After I got out of high school, I thought I want to be a framer.

 

And after getting really tired of carrying three quarter inch plywood up a ladder, I said, Nope, time to go back to school and study architecture. And from there I worked at a variety of firms in Manhattan, in Westchester County, doing a variety of different work. And when I found this firm, the scale work that we were doing, the residential work, it tied into something I loved with my single family housing experience.

 

It kind of stuck and I ended up staying here for quite a while.

 

00;05;17;01 - 00;05;23;25

DP

It's a long time practicing as an architect. I kind of say the same thing about or to myself about how long it's been.

 

00;05;23;27 - 00;06;23;12

TL

Sure, I've really grown in the company here. It's been a fantastic partnership with Ari. When I started, I came in really as an assistant project manager. A lot of my experience was not relative to the scale of the projects we were doing, although in other firms I was working in a bit of a leadership role running point on smaller scale projects, so it took a little time to learn the ropes, if you will, in the different construction types.

 

And I've moved up into the role of studio director now, so I work very closely with our senior management and the rest of our senior staff looking at our workload, our resource management, project proposals, client relationships and really stay involved with the team from the very start of the project until close out to handle the day to day operations of the office as a whole.

 

Ari, myself and our controller meet frequently to talk about some of the more boring business side of things and then the more fun happens working with the architects on the day to day and the projects.

 

00;06;23;15 - 00;06;33;19

DP

So let's dig in here and talk about this very interesting facade of yours. How did your office get the project, or is this a project that the office created?

 

00;06;33;21 - 00;07;57;02

TL

Yeah, this was actually an interesting project that came at a time when everything started shutting down right at the start of the COVID pandemic. And we had a really good recommendation from a long time client that we had worked with, and we had met a new client remotely who was involved on the construction side of things, and we hit it off.

 

We started talking and it was the first time ever that I met someone virtually and had meetings like this on screens, and we were trying to build a new professional working relationship. So it was very unique in the way that the project started. And again, we do a lot of our work really based on recommendations. We really pride ourselves in building good relationships with our client base, and that's really how the project got started.

 

They had this unique property in Bushwick and if you know the area in Brooklyn at all, it's a lot of small scale row housing, if you will, maybe 3 to 4 storeys and there really aren't too many open lots. And in this particular project it was unique. There was a large portion of the lot that had an easement that couldn't be built on it, and it provided a good amount of air rights which allowed us to follow the zoning path to do a much taller building than you usually would see in this neighborhood.

 

Most of the buildings were very close together, and that's really how it started and how the project grew and how we ended up with a 12 storey building in the middle of Bushwick.

 

00;07;57;05 - 00;08;04;19

DP

So did you guys know right away that you were going to be able to make a tall building there, or did it take a little bit of examination first?

 

00;08;04;21 - 00;08;48;13

TL

It took a little bit of examination. Usually what we do as architects is we really try to help guide our clients to bring their projects to fruition. This is the property I have. What can you build? How much can you build? There are two different zoning parts you can follow, primarily three different zoning parts in New York City that will help you establish the bulk, the height, the size of the building.

 

So we'll study that first and foremost with our clients and present them the different options. And based on the geometry of this lot, when we saw the potential to get a little height on this building, be separated from the other surrounding residential buildings, it gave them a nice opportunity to have a building with some great potential for views in an otherwise low height area.

 

00;08;48;15 - 00;08;53;12

DP

So what was the scope and the programmatic requirements for the project once you got rolling?

 

00;08;53;14 - 00;09;32;03

TL

Typically and specifically to this project, our scope was everything from working with the development team to help them flush out the parameters of their funding program. So when you work with different agencies in New York City and in the state and you're following certain guidelines to provide certain square footages and distribution of units, we work right at the very beginning with them to help them find the right mix and size of units, right with the development team.

 

From there, we work through design and construction administration all the way until the close of the project. So we really gave soup to nuts services here. Full scope on the building.

 

00;09;32;05 - 00;09;48;24

DP

So let's talk a little bit about the building design stylistically. So you guys designed quite a unique facade, while the other three facades, from what I can tell from the photos, are relatively subdued. Tell us about the main idea behind this.

 

00;09;48;26 - 00;11;17;22

TL

First and foremost, we love Brick. Brick as an architect, for us, it's really a timeless material and it's a durable material and it fits in really well to so many different urban fabrics in so many different places. In my opinion, what made 389 unique was the timing that this project was happening. It was happening at a time where the future was uncertain.

 

We didn't know what was going to come of this pandemic. We had to be incredibly mindful of the budget. Many times we like to create building facades that are two different materials having a nice dialog or different color bricks. So we really had to be mindful of availability of product and the economics, the budget, and really try to come up with something that would be unique but be something that the client could achieve.

 

So this is what started driving us to start playing with different bonding patterns if we stacked the brick one way versus another way, if we do a running bond versus a stack bond versus a Flemish bond, how can we play around with our stack in patterns and try to make something unique? So that was really what started pushing us in this direction of going with a single color brick and then really focusing on how to find a challenge enough for the mason that they don't hate us and say these are architects of the worst.

 

Have something be achievable for them. But that also will give a nice unique context to the neighborhood.

 

00;11;17;25 - 00;11;24;28

DP

Were there any aesthetic reviews of the building before you guys got rolling with the city?

 

00;11;24;28 - 00;11;49;21

TL

With the city for this particular project, there were no agencies on the city or state side that had any reason to opine on the design. We were not going for any variances. We didn't really have to go to the community board, although we did not need their aesthetic approvals. It is something that we're always mindful of working within the urban fabric and how it's going to lend itself to the context of the neighborhood is always an important consideration of ours.

 

00;11;49;23 - 00;12;01;09

DP

So let's back up just a little bit. So the building plan, are we talking rectangle, square, relatively straightforward. Then of course, there's parking on the site. You had said that there was a portion of the site that you could not build on.

 

00;12;01;11 - 00;13;07;01

TL

That's correct. So for this particular massing to make this building work, the footprint was rather small. It actually made a very efficient floor plate with a very tight core of stairs, elevator and corridor, and then apartments around all sides of that. So it really became a very compact, high efficiency floor plate with very little loss factor. And it was something that we were able to just work all the way up the building.

 

So there were quite a bit of revisions back and forth, variations that we had worked on to find the right mix and balance of that to fit within the envelope. The same thing then translated to the facade a bit earlier we were talking about what did the design iterations look like there, through the whole process of finding the right solution and the facade design that we felt was the right match for this building.

 

We did digital 3D models, plenty of sketches and even on site mockups working together with the Masons saying, We know you can do this, we believe in you, please don't kill us. And did plenty of mock ups there to really work it out.

 

00;13;07;03 - 00;13;11;25

DP

Was it a challenge finding a good mason, or did you guys have somebody lined up right off the bat?

 

00;13;11;27 - 00;14;04;09

TL

I think that's really one of the keys. You have to have really good subs. So whatever the type of work you're doing in this case, the Masons, you need to have a good working relationship with them. And often it's the architect working directly with the general contractor. But in these cases we invited the Masons into the architecture meetings, we invited them into the AOC meetings towards the end and said, Look, let's work through some of these details.

 

Let's talk through it. How is this going to work? It wasn't incredibly complex or challenging, but we wanted to make sure that the person who was directing their team to install the Brick really felt confident that they could achieve what we were looking for. We never wanted to come out on site and say, This is all wrong. That's not what we want to do.

 

And I really think engaging with those professionals early on is important to try to get the end result that you're looking for.

 

00;14;04;12 - 00;14;16;20

DP

Yeah, we try to bring in a contractor at schematic design. Once we wrap up schematic design, we have them price the project. This is in high and residential work that I do. So single family homes.

 

00;14;16;22 - 00;14;33;09

TL

Right? And in this case we didn't have a mason lined up. We didn't have a recommendation. The developer slash contractor, they were one and the same here. They had already had an existing relationship with this Mason and we started just working with them early on in the process.

 

00;14;33;11 - 00;14;54;17

DP

So could you do your best to describe the evolution of the design of that facade and then try to describe the facade? I'm going to encourage our listeners to go to the Glen-Gery site and take a look at some of these photographs because it's really striking. I've never seen anything like it. It's a great idea. The clients must have been thrilled when you presented the drawings.

 

00;14;54;19 - 00;17;33;18

TL

Thank you very much for that. We've seen a lot of example of brick facade that has quite a bit of movement in it, and these brick facades more often than not, are panelized prefab, and that's a way that you can achieve quite a bit of movement with brick using this idea of this undulation and this movement in the brick as an inspiration.

 

That's what triggered us to start thinking about how a brick pattern, the stacking pattern, really might help us achieve what we wanted to do here. So if our listeners are familiar with Brick parents, which I hope they are, we're in a brick podcast, we utilized a Flemish bond pattern and a running bond pattern. So the Flemish bond pattern has a standard brick with the long face.

 

The following brick is then rotated 90 degrees with the short face and the pattern is repeated. Taking this idea of combining a Flemish bond pattern with a running bond pattern, we now have these bricks that are half size, if you will, square proportion to create the movement and the undulation throughout the facade. We detailed a Flemish bond pattern with a large number of running bond, then a increasing increment of Flemish bond and a decreasing increment to running bond.

 

So we took the pattern and as you got closer to the center of the pattern we created, you had a higher frequency of Flemish bond. And as you moved away towards the end of the pattern that moved vertically up the building, it was stretched out with more running bond. So that's a lot of back and forth with different bond patterns.

 

Ultimately, by having that Flemish bond brick, we then protruded it out from the facade in the center of the pattern where the Flemish bond patterns are stacked very closely together. The bricks protruded the largest amount. And then as that pattern was separated and pulled apart from top to bottom, the brick became closer and closer to the facade.

 

So we basically created a formula that the mason can follow. For every increment, the brick would step out a half inch further, and this is what gave the facade that undulation, as you move up the bricks, steps out and back in by using this bonding pattern. It also created a really dynamic shadow which was something that we really loved.

 

When the sun hits the building the right way, you get a really fantastic shadow where you have that brick and it just really, in my opinion, created a beautiful cadence that worked through that pattern.

 

00;17;33;21 - 00;17;41;27

DP

So it really does remind one of Braille. So how far what's the furthest protrusion for one brick?

 

00;17;42;00 - 00;18;01;07

TL

I do like that description of Braille. You instantly have an image in your mind of these protruding points that they create the pattern. The furthest protrusion is about two and a half inches at the center of the pattern. And then as it works its way down in half inch increments, it goes back down to zero and the pattern becomes flush.

 

00;18;01;10 - 00;18;20;02

DP

So you guys said that you worked on this in 2D and in 3D. I would imagine if you did some sun studies, you got a better sense for how much shade and shadow was going to be produced by these protruding bricks? Did you do the project in BIM? Is it Revit? Because I saw 2D drawings of this?

 

00;18;20;04 - 00;18;42;25

TL

Yes. It isn't Revit. It is a BIM project. While we were in the design phase, we actually used a few different softwares SketchUp and Enscape and Revit along with AutoCAD, and we really did a series of 2D sketches, 2D drawings and 3D studies, partial facade studies. Just to get a sense of how this all might look.

 

00;18;42;28 - 00;18;49;26

DP

And how many iterations ultimately did you go through? I mean, big iterations, like is it two or three or ten or?

 

00;18;49;28 - 00;19;42;12

TL

Once we just came to the conclusion that we need to stick with a singular color brick here in the front, I'd say we probably had about ten different versions. It's a slim, tall building with very large windows, really trying to maintain a nice modulation of those windows in that spacing, but also then maintain a standardized brick dimension. So for a long time we were playing around with the inches of the bricks so that we were at a half size brick or full size brick.

 

Should we use a stack bond and emphasize the verticality of the building? How often should we introduce a horizontal element so that it's not looking like a stack of pancakes, for lack of a better expression? So really, we had a good amount of iterations here until we got to the point where we really like the running bond, Flemish bonds.

 

00;19;42;14 - 00;19;58;19

DP

I like the way you describe that. From what I remember looking at these photos, the windows are framed out differently. So you have a series of windows which have an individual frame, and then at one point in the building, that frame actually wraps a few stories of windows, right? So you break up the facade that way, too.

 

00;19;58;19 - 00;20;26;03

TL

Exactly. Playing with the verticality of the building, we did group a series of windows, two windows stacked vertically, three windows stacked vertically and created a frame around those windows. And this helped take that 12 story building and just give it a little bit of scale as it moved up the building. So these groups have two vertical windows that are now framed together.

 

Then also had the movement of the undulating brick happening between them.

 

00;20;26;05 - 00;20;28;28

DP

You guys really thought through it. It's a real beautiful facade.

 

00;20;29;04 - 00;20;29;29

TL

Thank you.

 

00;20;30;01 - 00;20;34;06

DP

So how big was the team that worked on the project? Just a few people?

 

00;20;34;08 - 00;21;17;08

TL

Every project is staffed with a dedicated associate director who are all registered architects, a project manager, and then the support staff. When we were in the design phase, we had the project manager working together with one of our designers. So we really had a team of to playing around with this and then bouncing the idea back off of the associate on the project.

 

Then once we really ramped it up into production, we would stack two or three people on the project. As you get closer to submission deadlines and trying to get into the Department of Buildings to get permits done, we would build the team up. Usually there was always at least two people on the project that were always there from day one.

 

They haven't left the project and they stayed on from beginning to end.

 

00;21;17;10 - 00;21;26;09

DP

So how long did it take to build the building? I would imagine it was pretty cool watching that facade go up. First couple stories. You must have been thinking, Wow, man, this is going to be something.

 

00;21;26;12 - 00;21;51;29

TL

You know, the construction team, they did a fantastic job. They had a really good crew out there. And around 24 months, the building went up and then all the fine details coming out of the pandemic. It was interesting. There were certain trades that just took longer because of materiality, distribution chain, supply chain, availability of product, which threw little curveballs here and there.

 

But all in all, the sequence and timing was fairly smooth.

 

00;21;52;01 - 00;22;01;13

DP

So it seems like I learned something new every project. Was there anything that you guys learned while you were out in the field or doing these drawings or dealing with the client?

 

00;22;01;16 - 00;22;48;06

TL

There certainly was. You know, I had spoken about the Mason earlier on, and that was certainly a good lesson. Building a good relationship with your Mason early in the project is really important and I joke about it. Sometimes they look at the architect's details and think, Are these guys crazy? We're not going to build this. There's going to be a better way to do it.

 

And I think that was really the big lesson we took here, establishing that good relationship and also giving the tradesmen the respect that they deserve. They're installing the work. They know some of the nuances of how this gets installed and taking that into consideration, finding that common ground so that you don't bring your ego into the conversation and giving them that professional respect and you're going to get it back.

 

That was definitely a good lesson here.

 

00;22;48;08 - 00;23;16;16

DP

That seems like a lesson I've learned over and over again throughout my career. When you're young, you go out there and you think you know everything and you've got an answer for everything, or you're going to fake your way through it, or however you choose to deal with it. But as you get older, you realize that these people that you're working with, many of them have an awful lot of experience, and it would be a good idea to sit and listen to them and actually ask them questions rather than tell them what to do.

 

00;23;16;18 - 00;23;38;10

TL

That's right. And I always find that working with our up and coming project managers and our younger staff, it's always those lessons that you try to instill in them. It helps them understand how to build those relationships because this industry is built on relationships and if we can do that, we're going to navigate successfully through any project.

 

00;23;38;13 - 00;23;58;03

DP

Well, you guys have been around a long time, 50 years. Goodness gracious. That's incredible. Congratulations, Tom. You've been an architect for over two decades. Based on what you know today about being an architect, do you have any words of advice for your younger self or maybe some young architects working their way up the ranks?

 

00;23;58;05 - 00;24;13;16

TL

Yes, don't worry. It's going to work out, if you love it, stick with it. It's a long road. And just when you think maybe you should change your major, you might still be out of college 20 years and asking yourself, Should I change my major? If you love it, stick with it. It's rewarding.

 

00;24;13;19 - 00;24;28;05

DP

That's really funny. I feel like I've changed my major all the time.

 

My goodness. So, Tom, it's been great to have you here. Thanks for your time. Where can people go to learn more about Wolfgang Architects and yourself?

 

00;24;28;07 - 00;24;38;19

TL

They can go right to our web site at Aufgang.com and they can find all the information about us there. They can follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter and all the different platforms.

 

00;24;38;21 - 00;24;45;21

DP

Well, thank you very much, Tom. It's been great. And I encourage people to go to the site and take a look at this very interesting building. Thank you.

 

00;24;45;29 - 00;24;50;18

TL

Doug. I really appreciate it. It was great chatting with you here today. I had a great time.

 

00;24;50;21 - 00;25;18;12

DP

Awesome. Thank you.