NEWS: Retail Reuse for interior landmark?
From the Tribeca Trib
Is Retail Right for ‘Sacred’ Lobby?
By Carl Glassman
POSTED DEC.29, 2006
David Levinson stood in the marble forest of soaring Doric columns, his eyes scanning the cavernous temple-like space that is the lobby of 195 Broadway.
“Think about owning this,” he said, opening his arms as if to embrace the grandeur of it all. “It’s awesome. I don’t think there’s a building like it in the city.”
As chairman of L&L Holding Co., Levinson, in fact, does own it—as well as the million square feet of office space above. This is the former home of AT&T, both its exterior and interior designated as city landmarks last year.
This month, Levinson aims to convince the Landmarks Preservation Commission that his painstakingly conceived plan to put three stores in the lobby—up to 12,000 square feet of retail space—will not spoil its magnificence.
“This is going to be done to the highest standard, otherwise we’re not doing it,” the owner said as he led a reporter on a tour of the space. “I’m not going to mess this up.” As yet, no retail tenants have been selected.
If his plan is approved, the lobby of 195 Broadway, with its 30-foot ceilings and bronze-and-alabaster chandeliers, will open to the public for the first time in years. It would be among only four of 14 landmarked interiors Downtown that the public can enter. Levinson said that putting stores in the lobby allows him to secure it for public use.
Visitors would traverse a corridor or “galleria” running between entrances at Dey and Fulton Streets, and opening onto each of the three stores. Off of Dey Street would be a separate, private entrance and lobby for the office tenants.
In order to create the individual spaces and maintain nearly unobstructed views of the grand interior, the proposal calls for sheer glass partitions rising 30 feet and ingeniously held in place by thin bronze cables and small plates. It is a partition system that the plan’s architect, Michael Gabellini, calls “operating at the outer limits of plausibility.”
An interior, 135-foot-long wall of glass, running the block-long length of lobby between Dey and Fulton Streets, will define the public corridor.
“We’ve created some budgets that are astronomical—many millions of dollars,” said Levinson. The glass, he said, “is the most expensive piece.”
Last month, Levinson and his team presented the plan to Community Board 1’s Landmarks Committee, where it won advisory approval. But the committee worried about how the openness of the space would be preserved, and about the visual effect of merchandise and signage.
“Those are the things that impact on the beauty of this space,” said committee member Marc Donnenfeld, “and the space right now is a sacred one.”
Another committee member, Eric Anderson, expressed “grave concerns” over the merchandising in the space. But he voted for the plan.
“One of the great things about the scheme,” he said, “is you will be able to go into the space—even if there’s some stuff in there that isn’t as pristine as the original use.”
The building is at the junction of the Fulton Street Transit Center and the new World Trade Center PATH terminal, due for completion in 2010. According to Levinson’s plans, the three stores on the ground floor would also open onto lower levels that will be traversed daily by hundreds of thousands of commuters and subway riders. Escalators and an elevator would be installed in the lobby.
In its resolution, later passed by the full board, the CB1 committee said it “could not abide” that equipment on the Broadway side.
“The more access I get to the lower level the less I have to do on the ground floor,” the owner responded later. “The real retailing activity can happen below.”
Levinson, who bought 195 Broadway in 2004 for a reported $270 million, said that aside from his long-time passion for the former AT&T building, he wanted to be at the hub of Lower Manhattan’s “wonderful redevelopment.” That will take time, he said, and so too might the approval for adapting the lobby of 195 Broadway to retail. But he is in no hurry.
“With all the positive things happening Downtown, it only gets better for me,” he said with a smile. “The fruit only ripens.”