While shiny and reflective have become the façade choices du jour in urban architecture, with their latest residential endeavor, Shildan Group offers a counterpoint to the notion that contemporary elegance must necessarily be synonymous glass.
The leading U.S. supplier of terracotta facades was tapped by Roman and Williams—husband-and-wife team behind the trendy Ace Hotel and interiors for the Standard, High Line—to dress the Fitzroy, a pre-war inspired, 10-story condominium rising steps from Manhattan’s High Line Park. Slated for completion in early 2017—and in keeping with the architects’ hallmark infusions of nostalgic Americana—the project features oversize copper-clad windows harking back to the heyday of art deco.
Reputed for translating ancient architectural terracotta—one of the world’s oldest building materials—into a contemporary form, while retaining the clay product´s natural warmth and tactility, Shildan was the obvious choice for a project that defiantly rejects the highly engineered aesthetic of “crystal towers”—and, in the strong words of Roman and Williams principal Stephen Alesch, other manifestations of the “synthetic movement that’s blanketed the earth with coldness.”
In that spirit, project architects specified Shildan terracotta in sumptuous green. Referencing thirties triumphs in terracotta like the famed Eastern Columbia Building in Los Angeles and Chicago´s Carbide and Carbon, Shildan’s contribution offers a new direction for future design, steeped in rich traditions of the past. A class—and not glass—act, to be sure.
For more info, please visit www.shildan.com.