211 Elizabeth St. (16 Prince St.)

[antinimby]

From Reel to Real, for Hollywood Design Team


http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2006/12/10/realestate/10post450.1.jpg
A rendering of 16 Prince Street, which will have retail space
and 15 condos.


By DAVID SCHARFENBERG
Published: December 10, 2006 (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/10/realestate/10post.html)

ON the corner of Prince and Elizabeth Streets in NoLita, a former Broadway producer and two former Hollywood production designers, skilled in ephemera, are taking a stab at permanence.

Peter Manning, producer of the Tony Award-winning “Sideman,” and two other developers plan to break ground next month on a seven-story brick building with a cornice and all the trappings of yesteryear.

The pair responsible for the design of the structure, which is to have 15 condos atop retail space, are Robin Standefer and Stephen Alesch, the husband-and-wife team who devised the sets for “Addicted to Love,” “Zoolander” and other Tinseltown fare.

Ms. Standefer and Mr. Alesch, whose firm, Roman & Williams, started in Manhattan two years ago, said they had grown tired of the temporary. “We finally felt that the fact that it lived forever in celluloid was not enough for us,” Ms. Standefer said.

“We really love things that have a certain weight and are really rooted and heavy,” she added, “and film ultimately was too tenuous and light.”

For all their talk of history and heft, the couple’s design for the building has its share of light, contemporary touches — porcelain-coated surfaces in the kitchens, and the wide windows common in SoHo lofts.

But their traditionalist plans for the exterior serve as a strong counterpoint to the curving glass and aluminum condo towers sprouting up on NoLita’s borders. Bullnose and coved brick surround windows. Muntins separate windowpanes. Pilasters abound.

The developers, in truth, did not have much room for shiny flourishes. They are building in Little Italy, where codes demand facades “predominantly of masonry.”

Still, Mr. Manning seemed pleased to construct something that would last longer than, say, a Broadway show. “We’re trying to create something that’s really going to stand the test of time,” he said, “and not fall out of fashion.”

Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

[antinimby]

Groundbreaking next month for 16 Prince Street


11-DEC-06

Ground will be broken next month for the 7-story residential condominium building planned for 16 Prince Street on the southwest corner of Elizabeth Street in NoLiTa and is being designed by Roman & Williams.

The developer is 16 Prince Street LLC, of which Robert A. Siegel is president and Peter Manning is vice president.

The building will contain 15 apartments and will have an fireplaces, an entrance marquee, an exposed rooftop watertank, and multipaned windows.

Its brown-brick masonry façade is attractively proportioned with a strong fenestration pattern, pilasters and a cornice.

Mr. Manning is producer of “Sideman,” which won a Tony Award. Robin Standefer and Stephen Alesch are the principals of Robin & Williams, which was founded in 1999 and is doing interior designs at the new condominium building at 40 Mercer Street being developed by André Balazs, and has worked on sets for such movies as “Addicted to Love” and “Zoolander.”

The site was formerly occupied by the De La Rosa Bakery and it is up the street from a delightful mid-block sculture garden on Elizabeth Street.

Copyright © 1994-2006 CITY REALTY.COM INC.

[ablarc]

If the detailing and workmanship are up to snuff, this is a viable approach.

[Fabrizio]

That BTW, is the most stylish rendering. Hand drawn water color. Love the murky, city sky. Not a cumulus to be found.

Boy, do they have taste: tan masonry, green window surrounds, red base. Notice the change in masonry color at the 3rdfloor. Im impressed.

Its Williamsburging... but we cant complain.

[lofter1]

Quite a few posts on 16 Prince in the "Manhattan Residential Developments" thread, starting HERE (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=110267&postcount=1037) (below from 7.19.06 -- a few posts on the background of the site follow that one) and continuing HERE (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=116384&postcount=1071) and HERE (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=125909&postcount=1122) (news and pics regarding a fire on this site from 8.22.06). Finally this POST (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=135168&postcount=1189), copied at the bottom, with pics of the La Rosa Bread Company building next door ...

***

16 PRINCE STREET

aka 16-18 Prince St. / 217 Elizabeth St.

There is a sidewalk shed up on this site...

DOB issued a DEMO (http://a810-bisweb.nyc.gov/bisweb/JobDetailsServlet?requestid=2&allisn=0001268942&allboroughname=&allnumbhous=&allstrt) permit for this site today, 7.19.06

There is currently an old 5-story brick building on this site -- formerly a bakery (great smells from here many years ago). A completely simple and utilitarian structure. The oldest info at DOB (http://a810-bisweb.nyc.gov/bisweb/ActionsByLocationServlet?allcount=11&requestid=16&allbin=1084914&stypeocv3=&pagenumber=1&ppremise60=&allinquirytype=BXS1OCV3&previous.x=35&previous.y=15) is from March 2, 1886 for a NEW BUILDING

Not sure what makes this particular corner "Nolita's most prominent corner" -- I'd argue that one block down, catty-corner from Old St. Pat's Cathedral should get that title ...

"Brand new luxury condominium on NoLita's most prominent corner"

All I gotta say is that this had better be top-notch and beautiful --


Architect???? "George Rycar Architects PC" is listed on a prior DOB (http://a810-bisweb.nyc.gov/bisweb/JobDetailsServlet?requestid=6&allisn=0001076581&allboroughname=&allnumbhous=&allstrt) application (Disapproved on 2.01.2005) to "Change Tax Lot Numbers / No work"http://www.rkf.com/images/FILESFORWEB_2005/16PrinceSt_mainb.jpg


http://www.rkf.com/listings/NEW/16Prince_main.asp

***

One of the great things about the location for 16 Prince Street is that on that same block (mid-block on Elizabeth between Prince <> Spring) is a through-block open space (Elizabeth <> Mott) -- the home of the Elizabeth Street Gallery (http://www.elizabethstreetgallery.com/) Sculpture Garden at 209 Elizabeth Street (partially seen at the far right in the photo above):

http://images.yelp.com/bphoto/UobatlVMDwz7k_iYHqn8NQ/l

yelp.com / Sarah B. (http://www.yelp.com/biz_photos/SfB4abDdeFol2fqrwa51LA?select=suLBAaOouAqXXkF1tFCl xA)

Some pics at flickr (http://www.flickr.com/photos/62943723@N00/78319924)

The Gallery is housed in the remaining La Rosa Bread Co. building, just to the south of where 16 Prince will go up:

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/Little%20Italy/DeLaRosa_01.jpg

How 209 Elizabeth looked it was renovated:

http://www.bluejake.com/images06/misc/2006_9_glarosarevisted1.jpg

http://www.bluejake.com/archives/200...ad_co_2004.php (http://www.bluejake.com/archives/2006/09/19/g_la_rosa_son_bread_co_2004.php)

NOTE: http://www.bluejake.com/archives.php is a great site for excellent photos of NYC (and other places)

[antinimby]

So 209 is not the one coming down right?

[lofter1]

No -- 209 has been restored and is now a Gallery linked to the sculpture garden (hmmm -- a picture is in order) ...

211-217 Elizabeth (where a fire has recently gutted what was there before) is where the new building will go up.

[Fabrizio]

Oh, up above where I mentioned, "Williamsburging" it....I meant Williamsburg as in Virginia.

imagine a whole neighborhood of "faithful reproductions" ....New York recreated like Celebration... weird or wonderful?

This ones going to be interesting to see if they pull it off. Seems the rendering shows it even more faithful to the past than 15CPW or those other reproductions downtown.

[MidtownGuy]

Looks amazing! Yipee! Everything's great, I especially love the base.

[lofter1]

It looks as if the designers of 217 might be going with cast iron for the facade at the street level (such as is seen at 209 Elizabeth) and with brick on the floors above.

Nice.

[ablarc]

Could it be we need more set designers working as architects?

[antinimby]

Forget set designers.

Mentally retarded pre-schoolers can do a better job than a couple of our local architects and you know which ones I'm talking about.

[pianoman11686]

First time I looked at the rendering, I thought: "Wow, that looks authentic."

Maybe it'll be the start of a new trend. Tastes have a tendency to be cyclical (sometimes).

[lofter1]

Some pics from this cloudy gray morning (not so good for my cell cam) in the vicinity of 16 Prince ...

From Prince Street:

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/Little%20Italy/16Prince_02a.jpg

From the south looking up towards 16 Prince / 217 Elizabeth, with the Elizabeth Street Gallery Sculpture Garden and 209 Elizabeth in the foreground:

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/Little%20Italy/16Prince_02b.jpg

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/Little%20Italy/16Prince_02d.jpg

The Elizabeth Street Gallery at 209 Elizabeth:

http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p242/Lofter1/Little%20Italy/16Prince_02e.jpg

[antinimby]

Is there a reason they left the graffiti on there even after doing the restoration?

[stache]

I think they were looking to juxtapose the grit of the exterior with the refinement of the new window and interior. Very clever, actualy.

[lofter1]

Is there a reason they left the graffiti on there even after doing the restoration?

If you look at the two pictures of the facade on the previous page (mine was taken just this week, the first is from a year or more ago) you'll see that on the cast iron parts of the facade there is now less graffiti, although the ghost of some of the previous graffiti does remain.

Methinks that this building simply is one that gets tagged -- and for now it appears that the owners have decided to flow with it.

[antinimby]

Marketing begins for 211 Elizabeth Street in NoLiTa


http://www.cityrealty.com/graphics/uploads/1208199216_elizabeth11.jpg


14-APR-08 (http://www.cityrealty.com/new_developments/news.cr?noteid=22882)

Marketing has started for the 7-story, residential condominium building at 211 Elizabeth on the southwest corner at Prince Street.

The developer is 16 Prince Street LLC, of which Robert A. Siegel is president and Peter Manning is vice president. Mr. Manning is producer of "Sideman," which won a Tony Award.

Roman & Williams, of which Robin Standefer and Stephen Alesch are the principals, is the architectural firm for the project, which has 15 apartments.

The building has a red-brick masonry facade that is attractively proportioned with a strong fenestration pattern, a cornice and an interesting roofline with five tall chimneys of staggered heights.

Apartments, which are described on the project's website as "bespoke homes," have wood-burning fireplaces and 9-foot-high, multi-paned, glass doors that separate the living and dining rooms. Floors are walnut herringbone parquet and the website states that "the baseboards, casings, windows and doors are trimmed in Roman & Williams' favorite high gloss black oil point by Fine Paints of Europe."

Kitchen cabinetry is framed in walnut and painted by hand with high gloss black paint and counters are rendered in Danish oiled wood. Kitchens have Sub Zero refrigerators and Viking ranges, dishwashers and wine coolers.

Bathroom walls, floors and vanity tops are Calacatta gold marble.

The building is very close to such popular restaurants as Public and Cafe Habana and Cafe Gitane and is not far from the New Museum of Contemporary Art on the Bowery and a Whole Foods store on Houston Street.

Some of the one-bedroom apartments have an angled entrance gallery with powder room that leads to a kitchen and dining area and then into the living room and that master bedroom and master bathroom.

The north apartment on the second floor has 1,688 square feet and a very unusual layout in which the living room has six sides with openings to the gallery, the dining room and another gallery that leads to the master bedroom.

Initial pricing ranges from about $1,550,000 for a 785-square-foot one bedroom apartment to $6,950,000 for the 2,189-square-foot penthouse, which has 1,397 square feet of terrace.

Copyright © 1994-2008 CITY REALTY.COM INC.

[Fahzee]

From Reel to Real, for Hollywood Design Team


http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2006/12/10/realestate/10post450.1.jpgfile:///c:/temp/moz-screenshot.jpg


the updated rendering looks less authentic than the original watercolor, no?

[lofter1]

The brick has started to go up here and it looks terrific -- has an "old" look without that theme park feel.

The entire building is covered in netting, so pics of the bricks aren't an option.

[Fahzee]

^ sweet - good to hear - I'll have to go by and check it out for myself.

[lofter1]

MODS: The official title of this development is "211 ELIZABETH"

Can that ^ be incorporated into the Thread Title (keeping the alternate address as well).

[lofter1]

The brick has started to go up here and it looks terrific --

has an "old" look without that theme park feel.


Working in the Brick-and-Mortar Tradition

NY TIMES (http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/25/working-in-the-brick-and-mortar-tradition/)
By Jake Mooney
July 25, 2008, 10:32 am

City Room Blog

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/07/25/nyregion/disp.533.jpg
(Photo: Andrew Henderson / The New York Times)
John McBride, the president of Mulroy Masonry, on site at Elizabeth No. 211.

John McBride, a mason — or bricklayer — from Donegal, Ireland, started in construction work when he was 16, specializing in it in school and eventually completing four years of training and another three years of work to get full trade certification. He started his own company, then came to the United States, where he worked for someone else again for six years, then started another company of his own, Mulroy Masonry in Maspeth, Queens.

In short, Mr. McBride, who is in his late 30s now, has spent more than half his life working with bricks. These are not the credentials that many people associate with modern Manhattan construction work, with its soaring glass-and-steel skyscrapers (notwithstanding the Empire State Building, which is, of course, made of stone).

But if the type of brickwork in which Mr. McBride’s specializes is not the norm in local construction anymore, there is still plenty to keep him busy — in part because with brick buildings less widespread, and less demand for brick workers, there are fewer masons who can do what his crew does. And what they do, in all its complexity, is a little dizzying, especially to the layman who might look at a brick wall and see little more than a stack of bricks and mortar.

I met Mr. McBride this week while working on the Dispatches feature for Sunday’s City section (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/27/nyregion/thecity/27disp.html), about a building at 211 Elizabeth Street (http://www.211elizabeth.com/#/Home/). On that site, where developers tore down an old brick warehouse building to build anew, they have decided, in an effort to blend with the neighborhood, to replace it with another brick building.

The developers, Robert Siegel and Peter Manning, hoped at first to incorporate the old structure into their plans, but it was too unstable, Mr. Siegel said. Besides, he added, “It was actually not as nice as this.”

In aiming to blend the new building with the existing brick buildings in the neighborhood — some of them a century old — the developers and their designers, at the firm Roman and Williams (http://www.romanandwilliams.com/), entered what can be a tricky and politically fraught area, with a language and value system of its own.

They wanted, Mr. Siegel said, to be “contextual,” but they did not want to “replicate” old styles or seem nostalgic — terms that suggest sentimentality or a lack of imagination, and carry negative connotations in the design world even when traditional materials like brick are involved. (One of the more withering labels for a design, one that Mr. Siegel did not evoke, even in the negative, is “fake historicism.” That is the charge that designers who venture into this realm want to avoid.)

In the end, Mr. Siegel said, summing up his team’s design goals, “I use the word ‘evocative.’”

Whatever the terminology, the building aims to be something different in the current marketplace. Stephen Alesch, co-founder of Roman and Williams with his wife, Robin Standefer, said that on a scale of one to 10, most brick buildings constructed in the city in the last 50 years score a 1 in terms of design complexity. On the same scale, he said, his firm’s design for 211 Elizabeth is about a 6.

For reference, he pointed to the northwest toward the Puck Building (http://www.nyc-architecture.com/SOH/SOH037.htm), on Lafayette Street, which he said would score a 10. Besides that building, a former printing facility that is now an event space, he said another high mark would go to the American Thread Building (http://www.epicharmus.com/masterpiece/2008/06/73-american-thread-building.html), on West Broadway in TriBeCa.

One thing both of those buildings had going for them, construction-wise, is that they were built in the late 19th Century, when there were more skilled masons around and their work came cheaper. Today, high-quality brickwork takes time, which takes money.

As Tom Vita, the project’s construction manager, put it, “That’s why a lot of these aren’t done anymore — nobody wants to spend the money to do it. Also, you’ve got to find masons to do it. It’s a craft; it’s not physically hard, it’s just having a knack, getting the bricks to line up.”

And that, he went on, is easier said than done. For one thing, since certain surfaces have to be flat and level, even a 1/8-inch difference between two columns of brick can throw everything off. And no two bricks are exactly the same. Then there is the amount of mortar in between them, which can be subtly adjusted to compensate for other variables — but not too much.

“You can maneuver it, you can move it left, right, down,” Mr. Vita said. “Never up. Once you lift a brick up, you can never put it back down.”

That, he said, is because once the mortar has been compressed, it cannot expand again. Also, on hot days mortar dries even faster, adding an extra element of time pressure. Even after all this, masons still have to scrape and groom the mortar, a process known as tooling. And, as in the case of a cantilevered section of brick on the Elizabeth Street building, they might have to wait for one row of bricks and mortar to set and dry in place before putting another row on top of it, to prevent the whole thing from toppling down.

Finally, there are a range of different patterns and techniques for arranging bricks to lock them in place, with names like the Flemish bond (http://diydata.com/techniques/brickwork/flemish/flemish.php), stretcher bond (http://diydata.com/techniques/brickwork/stretcher.php) and English bond (http://diydata.com/techniques/brickwork/english/english.php). Spend some time looking at them and you may never see a brick wall as just a brick wall again.

All this leaves aside other historically evocative details in the building, like its double-hung windows with wood frames. But the windows, Mr. Alesch said, are also where the historic touches had to end: They are much larger than the windows in an older building.

“We want to stay very much in the tradition of the neighborhood,” he said. “But we also don’t want you to walk in and say, ‘Wow, look at those tiny windows.’”

[brianac]

^^^

Sorry Lofter, I had not seen this, and posted same article HERE (http://wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=242374&postcount=20)

Mods. You can delete my posting if you wish.

[lofter1]

No problem, brianac.

One might wonder if the NY Times doesn't have some sort of a stake in this development project at 211 Elizabeth Street,
given this weeks saturation coverage :cool:

Old World Brickwork, at New World Prices

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/07/26/nyregion/24181009.JPG
Andrew Henderson/The New York Times
Three of the people involved in the project — John McBride, president of
Mulroy Masonry, far left, Robert Siegel, of Ghent Realty Services, top, and
Robin Standefer, designer of Roman and Williams — discussing the work.

NY TIMES (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/27/nyregion/thecity/27disp.html?ref=thecity)
By JAKE MOONEY
July 27, 2008

Dispatches

Put on a hard hat, stand on the roof of the building under construction at 211 Elizabeth Street, and look north. You will see an old brick building, across Prince Street, with white ornamentation around the windows. To the right is another old brick building, with a newer brick addition where the cornice used to be. Next to that is a third brick building.

Brick, in other words, is the architectural norm in this part of town, which is called either Little Italy or NoLIta. The building at 211 Elizabeth, as it happens, is brick too. But unlike its neighbors, it is brand-new, which may not be obvious if its designers and developers get their way.

The goal, Robin Standefer, the designer, explained last week, is to recede into the neighborhood’s fabric rather than stand out, and to evoke the brickwork of neighboring buildings that have stood for a century. As Ms. Standefer spoke, she stood on the roof amid piles of bricks, buckets of mortar and a crew of mostly Irish masons placing those bricks along the top edge of the building.

In an era when most new buildings are glass, and many new brick buildings are made from factory-generated brick panels, the idea behind 211 Elizabeth — an intricately ornamented facade, with bricks laid carefully by hand — counts as a bold concept, even if it is similar to the approach used for all the old buildings nearby.

“We wanted something that really fit in, but also showed, on a craftsmanship level, that you can still do it,” said Ms. Standefer, the co-founder, with her husband, Stephen Alesch, of the firm Roman and Williams.

You can, in fact, still do it. But unlike the Italians who dominated the masonry trade and the neighborhood a century ago, you cannot do it easily or cheaply. Befitting the slogan on a banner near the building’s sales office — “Beautiful. Bespoke. NoLIta.” — a few bricks used for the more complex ornamentation had to be specially made, at a cost of about $3,000 for the 10 of them.

Other special bricks, for which molds already existed, cost upward of $4 each, as opposed to around 55 cents for a normal brick. The masons, led by John McBride of Donegal, Ireland, and now Maspeth, Queens, do not come cheap, because not every mason can do what they do.

Most of them studied and worked for seven years to get their certification. Their expertise is necessary, Mr. McBride said, because while a mason who is building a plain wall by hand might lay 400 bricks a day, some of the trickier parts of this building would slow him to 25 a day.

Such numbers can give a developer heartburn, but the men behind this project, Robert Siegel and Peter Manning, can take solace in their asking prices: $3.9 million for a two-bedroom condominium; prices start at $1.5 million for a one-bedroom.

What it all adds up to is a structure that is as contextual, as architects say, in terms of the neighborhood’s present as it is with its past. In the present, a restaurant down the block called Peasant serves a $28 bowl of risotto, and another Elizabeth Street neighbor provides a shave and a haircut for $50 (that’s 400 bits).

What the onetime peasants who once populated Elizabeth Street would have thought of all this we cannot know for sure. But they might have recognized the craftsmanship.

Laying bricks, even on a simple project, is more complex than it looks. As the patterns in a facade get more intricate, the mason’s calculations multiply: how much mortar to use, when to reach for a slightly larger or smaller brick or push the brick into place a little more firmly.

Thursday afternoon, Mr. McBride was on the roof, looking over the edge at some fresh cornice work with the project’s construction manager, Tom Vita. Good masons are harder to find these days, they were saying, and many sons and grandsons of old construction workers are looking for work that isn’t quite so taxing.

Mr. Vita’s son worked on the site as a laborer, but drifted away to a lower-paying job as a lifeguard. As the father explained with a shrug, “He said, ‘No, I got an easier job watching the girls walk up and down the beach.’ ”

Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company

[lofter1]

Slide Show from the NY TIMES (http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2008/07/26/nyregion/072708-Dispatches_index.html) of the masonry work at 211 Elizabeth Street ...

Old-Fashioned Brickwork, at New-Fashioned Prices

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/images/photo/2008/07/27/072708-Dispatches/24181039.JPG
Andrew Henderson/The New York Times
Mr. McBride, of Donegal, Ireland, and now Maspeth, Queens, against the new brickwork.
His masons do not come cheap, because not every mason can do what they do.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/07/26/nyregion/24181047.JPG
Andrew Henderson/The New York Times

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/images/photo/2008/07/27/072708-Dispatches/24181033.JPG
Andrew Henderson/The New York Times
The goal of the hand-laid brickwork is to recede into the neighborhood's fabric rather than
stand out, and to evoke the facades of neighboring buildings that have stood for a century.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/07/26/nyregion/24181045.JPG
Andrew Henderson/The New York Times

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/images/photo/2008/07/27/072708-Dispatches/24181003.JPG
Andrew Henderson/The New York Times
Damien Nugent, foreman for Mulroy Masonry, on a break.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/images/photo/2008/07/27/072708-Dispatches/24181007.JPG
Andrew Henderson/The New York Times
Good masons are harder to find these days, and many sons and grandsons
of old construction workers are looking for work that isn't quite so taxing.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/07/26/nyregion/24181025.JPG
Andrew Henderson/The New York Times
While a mason who is building a plain wall by hand might lay 400 bricks a day, some of
the trickier parts of this building would slow him to 25 a day, said Mr. McBride.

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/07/26/nyregion/24181041.JPG
Andrew Henderson/The New York Times
Laying bricks, even on a simple project, is more complex than it looks. As the patterns in a
facade get more intricate, the mason's calculations multiply: how much mortar to use, when
to reach for a slightly larger or smaller brick or push the brick into place a little more firmly.

[lofter1]

MODS: Bumping this request ...



MODS: The official title of this development is "211 ELIZABETH"

Can that ^ be incorporated into the Thread Title (keeping the alternate address as well).

[lofter1]

CURBED (http://curbed.com/archives/2008/11/06/211_elizabeth_shows_off_some_brand_new_olde_bricks .php#comment-217025) reports:

211 Elizabeth Shows Off Some Brand New Olde Bricks

http://curbed.com/uploads/2008_11_211Eliz1.JPG
The corner of Elizabeth and Prince, recently un-netted.

The new building at 211 Elizabeth (http://curbed.com/archives/2008/04/11/development_du_jour_211_elizabeth.php) on the corner of Prince Street in Nolita
has stripped off some of its construction netting to reveal the intricate
olde-style brick that's been going up underneath. The story of the
brickwork was chronicled by the Times last summer and duly archived by
the intrepid crew over at Wired New York (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=242348&postcount=23). The creative team from Roman
& Williams wanted to create a building that was "evocative" of the past,
but not "nostalgic" or "faux"-ish. To achieve the effect they had bricks
specially molded at the whopping cost of $3K for ten of the heavy
suckers. Add to that a crew of expert masons out of Donegal, Ireland,
and this condo-castle earns the words Beautiful & Bespoke. Those "B"s go
well with the buyer's Bonus Black Bike that we told you about (http://curbed.com/archives/2008/10/24/adventures_in_marketing.php) last
month. Toss in the newly-buffed and burnished 11 Spring (http://curbed.com/archives/2008/11/03/inside_11_spring.php) down the way
and this block is now book-ended by big-league brickage.

http://curbed.com/uploads/2008_11_211Eliz2.JPG
Evocative brick rising above Prince Street.

http://curbed.com/uploads/2008_11_211Eliz3.JPG
The over-sized double hung windows encased in brick.

http://curbed.com/uploads/2008_11_211Eliz4.JPG
Guess which of those bricks cost upwards of $300 a piece.

http://curbed.com/uploads/2008_11_211Eliz7.JPG
Watercolor of the site; and the bricks (Photos R: Andrew Henderson/The New York Times).

· Development Du Jour: 211 Elizabeth (http://curbed.com/archives/2008/04/11/development_du_jour_211_elizabeth.php) [Curbed]
· 211 Elizabeth St. (16 Prince St.) Thread (http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showpost.php?p=242348&postcount=23) [Wired New York]
· Adventures in Marketing (http://curbed.com/archives/2008/10/24/adventures_in_marketing.php) [Curbed]
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