Construction is now complete on Lantern House, a pair of residential buildings straddling the High Line at 515 West 18th Street in Chelsea. Designed by Thomas Heatherwick with SLCE Architects as the architect of record and developed by Related Companies, the 10- and 22-story structures yield a total of 181 residential units with sales and marketing led by Related Sales LLC and Corcoran Sunshine Marketing Group. Lantern House is bound by Tenth Avenue the east, West 18th Street to the south, West 19th Street to the north, and Frank Gehry’s IAC Building immediately to the west.
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
YIMBY had the pleasure of documenting and photographing the rise of Lantern House and the installation of its signature sculptural windows over the past several years. The imagery of the High Line running directly through the middle of the site and bringing its elevated stretch of greenery over the streets of Chelsea between the two edifices is now fully realized as the trees have grown out their leaves.
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
The main entrance is located on the southern end of the property, where hexagonal stone tiles line the floors leading to the front doors and leave space for adjacent garden beds. A sweeping roofline tops the floor-to-ceiling glass on the first floor and elegantly joins the buildings.
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
The first floor on the northern and southern sides of the shorter eastern portion of Lantern House is home to retail space, with the majority of the frontage along Tenth Avenue.
Lantern House. Photo by Michael Young
The homes in Lantern House have been designed by March & White and range from one- to four-bedroom layouts with an average of 10-foot, 9-inch-high ceilings. A number of the residential units come with outdoor landscaped terraces that offer expansive views of the High Line, Chelsea, Hudson Yards, and the rest of the Midtown skyline. YIMBY last reported that prices for the homes start at $1.95 million, with amenities including a doorman, concierge service, a common courtyard and outdoor garden, a meeting room, a fitness center with spa and swimming pool, an entertainment room, residential lounges, a children’s playroom, and private parking for 175 vehicles.
Subscribe to YIMBY’s daily e-mail
Follow YIMBYgram for real-time photo updates
Like YIMBY on Facebook
Follow YIMBY’s Twitter for the latest in YIMBYnews
Interesting buildings, will add to my “must see” list for next visit to NY.
But with all those angled windows, it will be a challenge to clean, even for “Monica”! ?
The design shook my mind very much, I was thinking as far as a grenade. This is a building in America that is not wanted like no other: Thanks to Michael Young.
Just simply terrible.
Real Estate Infamy!
Every time I look out my west window I see this building and the XI which now resemble industrial buildings of the past.The unfinished XI making the chemicals and the Heatherwick Barrels storing it. Bring back the 10th Avenue Cowboys.
Though these two will be mixed in controversy for a long time (for which I do believe that the windows are very weird and somewhat ugly too), you do have to admit that the engineering and detail-work of the Latern House is just incredible. It truly is.
*Lantern*
It seems a pity that the 3-D effect couldn’t have been more fully realized. As built, the exteriors of the building’s frame are expressed in flat planes. The finished appearance would have been much more textural and dramatic if the floor edges had followed the horizontal curve of each window with the vertical elements set at the vertical edges of the window frames. This would obviously have had cost implications which, aesthetic considerations aside, might have been the prohibiting factor.
The façade design is very similar to Heatherwick’s 2017, grain-silo-to-hotel conversion also deploying floor-to-floor lantern windows in Cape Town, South Africa.
Those windows will leak like a sieve. My sister lived in a building that non-flat architectural windows, and they could never be sealed correctly
Looks more like a project that should be built in London. I don’t know, it just seems like there’s a lack of those walk-ups and other missing-middle options in New York right now.
Love it!!!
It looks like a rack for dusty grenades
Glad it’s not in my neighborhood
It’s a welcome change from the usual boring boxes we’re given. I predict it will be beautiful when illuminated from within at night.