Two BKSK Projects Unanimously Approved by the LPC

We are thrilled to announce that on Friday May 8th, two of BKSK Architects’ projects, 21 Greenwich Avenue, and 16 East 16th Street were unanimously approved by all eleven Landmarks Preservation Commissioners at the LPC’s first ever virtual Public Meeting.

The 21 Greenwich project is a restoration, plus a vertical and horizontal expansion, of a 3-story historic structure on the southwest corner of Greenwich and W. 10th St. The final development will read as two distinct buildings: a restored 3-story corner building with a setback 4th floor next to an entirely new 5-story infill. They engage in a quiet interplay between an idiosyncratic example of Greenwich Village in the 1840’s and a contemporary interpretation of today’s Greenwich Village. Together, they create a new multi-family dwelling, with full floor apartments a duplex penthouse, and ground floor retail.

16 East 16th Street involves ambitious restoration work in this substantial expansion of a 6-story R. H. Robertson-designed YWCA dormitory from 1891, now being converted to a new boutique hotel. Our restoration work for this project comes in two forms: 1) a faithful re-creation of the sandstone ground floor masonry, entirely removed in the 1950’s, and 2) a leap-of-faith “restoration/interpretation” of Robertson’s original design for a never-realized gabled 7th floor. Behind the historic façade, the new hotel will extend further into the unusually deep site, yet retain key portions of the historic masonry walls and offer guests a sense of both renewal within, and reverence for, the Ladies’ Mile historic district.