Rockefeller University

[Merry]

Historic University's Fresh Look

by ANTON TROIANOVSKI

One of the most striking new buildings to be completed in Manhattan this year is hidden from public view. On the gated campus of Rockefeller University between York Avenue and the East River, a renovated research center includes a new building with a curving, five-story glass facade that leans forward like the side of an inverted cone.

The new glass building is the centerpiece of the Collaborative Research Center, a $380 million renovation effort that grew out of years of deliberation over how to modernize the historic university's research facilities. A previous administration had advocated a brand-new structure to replace lab space in two adjacent buildings that dated to the first half of the 20th century. Instead, the university in 2006 decided to keep labs in those two buildings but to renovate them and to build a new glass edifice to connect them.


The new glass building at Rockefeller University connects two old buildings and has an open staircase.

The result: a facility that, like many new offices, creates more common space as well as a more efficient work area. The laboratory floors have no corridors, a design that saves space and, university officials say, allows microbiologists, immunologists, and other researchers to collaborate more easily.

The new glass building also connects the two old buildings vertically, with an open staircase running through an atrium that continues the elliptical-cone shape of the outside facade. "This is essentially the only staircase on the campus that encourages anybody to walk up it," says John Tooze, vice president for scientific and facilities operations. Tables, couches and chairs are placed throughout the atrium floors.

Viewed from outside, the facade juts out over a three-block-long leafy mall designed 50 years ago by landscape architect Daniel Kiley. The mall is otherwise lined by staid buildings of brick and stone.

"We wanted it to distinguish itself from the old buildings," one of the project's architects, Paul Broches of Mitchell Giurgola Architects LLP, says. "It introduces something that's quite contemporary and of the moment."

The campus isn't open to the public, but the university sometimes holds concerts and other public events.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...rk_real_estate



More historic from Wikipedia:


Founder's Hall

[Derek2k3]

Cool. I was wondering how this would turn out. They are also suppose to be building a research tower on the campus.
Rockefeller's campus also has one of the coolest pedestrian bridges in the city.

I don't know why all the attachments are out of order, but what each one is should be self-explanatory.

[lofter1]

Looks good.

The "Manage Attachments" feature seems to have a mind of its own -- even if attached images are numbered in order they show up in some random order as attachments. There is a way to control that. If, after uploading images, you click the "Insert Inline" option (resulting in the images showing up where you want them amidst you text, rather than in a box with "Attached Thumbnails" at the bottom of the post as seen above) and then "Preview Post" it gives the poster the chance to arrange the images (by cutting & pasting) as best suits the story. It's definitely more time consuming (not terribly so).