I would like a building that impacts the skyline somewhat. If a 500 footer can do that in this location then I'm cool with. As NYguy said, a 700 footer would be great.

http://www.pacoletmilliken.com/image...t-park-nyc.jpg

http://www.pacoletmilliken.com/

^ That would look about right for the location.

That's the tower that Pacolet will build. I like it.

This is a great day for NY. Osama was killed, the Drake will rise like a phoenix and this nice tower shows up too! :cheers:

omg its gorgeous!!!! win!!!!

Nice fit; not overdone.

Looks fine, though hopefully the curtain wall is nicer than the one shown in that thumbnail. Something along the lines of Goldman Sachs (another Harry Cobb project) or BOA wouldn't be amiss. But otherwise it's a respectably efficient design which is really just fine for Midtown.

Hines unveils new Bryant Park tower
August 08, 2011 11:00AM

http://www.observer.com/files/2011/0...BryantPark.jpg

Rendering of 1045 Sixth Avenue Houston-based real estate firm Hines revealed the Pei Cobb Freed & Partners design for its forthcoming Bryant Park office tower. The Wall Street Journal reported the 28-story, 450,000-square-foot structure at 1045 Sixth Avenue will feature concave detailing on its hourglass-shaped, glassy exterior and a large stainless steel disc suspended over the entrance at the corner of 40th Street. "The building was conceived in response to the extraordinary circumstance of its location at the corner of Bryant Park," said architect Henry Cobb.

The tower is being built in partnership with Pacolet Milliken Enterprises, which has owned the land since 1954. Hines will wait until it signs some tenants and obtains construction financing before beginning work on the tower, according to the Wall Street Journal. Demolition of the previous structure is already complete, so construction could begin as early as 2012, and occupancy may be ready by 2014. Hines will seek LEED certification for the office tower.

Hines recently sold 750 Seventh Avenue for more than $800 per square foot, or $485 million, and announced a $1 billion medical property venture with New York State Retirement Fund earlier this month. [WSJ]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/07/re...1&ref=business

Square Feet
With Financing Still Rare, New York Developments Start to ReboundBy JOTHAM SEDERSTROM
Published: September 6, 2011
http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/...ES-1-popup.jpg
When the development firm Hines began exploring plans for a state-of-the-art, ground-up office tower overlooking Bryant Park in April 2009, the notion seemed far-fetched at best, given the economic mood.

Construction is expected to begin next year for a 28-story tower at 1045 Avenue of the Americas in Manhattan. The tower will serve as something of a gateway to neighboring Bryant Park.

Demolition at 1045 Avenue of the Americas began in 2009, and the project has avoided pitfalls.
After all, Lehman Brothers had collapsed seven months earlier and Bernard L. Madoff had just pleaded guilty to federal felony charges in his vast financial Ponzi scheme. By the end of 2009, construction had frozen at development sites all across Manhattan. But in the nearly 30 months since those discussions, Hines’s plan to build a 28-story, glass-and-...stainless steel tower at 1045 Avenue of the Americas has withstood many of the obstacles that have thwarted other real estate developers.

“In no point in the last 30 years across all the cycle changes have we ever not been active,” said Tommy Craig, a senior vice president and head of Hines’s regional office in New York. “Resilience is one of the defining virtues of our firm.”

With a search for equity partners and a marketing campaign set to begin this week, the 450,000-square-foot building is one of two Manhattan projects now in the works for Hines. The other, a 72-story mixed-use building at 53 West 53rd Street, is set to rise adjacent to the Museum of Modern Art once an equity source is chosen. The project, designed by Jean Nouvel, was scaled down recently from its original height of 82 stories.....

http://www.goupstate.com/article/201...er-in-New-York

Spartanburg-based Pacolet Milliken plans 28-story office tower in New York


http://www.goupstate.com/apps/pbcsi....=1083&MaxW=728


By Trevor Anderson
October 4, 2011

It's great to see that this proceeding. Only in NY can office towers, hotels and condos rise during a recession!

http://www.archpaper.com/news/articles.asp?id=5587

Unveiled> 1045 Avenue of the AmericasPei Cobb Freed designs new glass tower to overlook Bryant Park.
http://www.archpaper.com/uploads/ima...6th_ave_01.jpg
Aerial view of building site at 40th Street and 6th Avenue.
Courtesy Bing1045 Avenue of the Americas
Architect: Pei Cobb Freed & Partners
Client: Hines with Pacolet Milliken Enterprises
Location: New York
Completion: 2014

Bryant Park is set to welcome a new tower of glass and steel courtesy of Hines and Pacolet Milliken Inc. The building, which takes up a whole block between West 39th and West 40th Streets, has been designed by Henry N. Cobb and Yvonne Szeto of Pei Cobb Freed & Partners and will offer 450,000-square feet of rentable space over 28 stories. Its biggest asset is the views—from the southwest corner of Bryant Park—and the location, between Midtown West to the north and the Garment District to the south.



1045 Avenue of the Americas.
Courtesy Pei Cobb Freed


Its proximity to the Garment District is relevant to the Pacolet Milliken company, whose roots in the textile manufacturing industry go back to 1865, when Seth Milliken made up one half of a small woolen fabrics firm in Maine named Deering Milliken Company. In 1868, Milliken moved to the heart of the American Textile Industry, New York City, and the following year also invested in a new facility in Pacolet, South Carolina, where the manufacturing operations grew. Milliken & Co moved its headquarters to the corner of 40th and Sixth Avenue in 1954 and has owned the property ever since. Milliken’s original building, a white marble modernist block with recessed ground floor access, was demolished in 2009, two years after the company its moved its headquarters. Today, given its proximity to Midtown, the Houston-based developer Hines is considering the potential for the base of the building to become trading floors, an opportunity to apply much of its experience in build- to-suit projects for clients including Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and UBS.

Designed to maximize the views across the park and as far as the historic Public Library, the building is sculpted into an hourglass shape, with feature windows on every tenant floor. Indeed its entrance on 40th Street curves inwards almost in reverence of the park it overlooks. “The hourglass façade detail will be a lens through which building occupants can view the park with dramatic and alluring immediacy,” said Cobb. Suspended over the corner entrance at 40th Street a signature gesture in the form of a 48-feet wide stainless steel disc will act as a canopy as well as a grand architectural feature.

It has been a busy year for Hines so far, having recently sold 750 Seventh Avenue for more than $800 per square foot, or $485 million, and announced a $1 billion medical property venture with New York State Retirement Fund earlier this month, as reported in the Wall Street Journal. In true spirit of the city’s free market landscape, Milliken & Co bought 65,085 sq ft of transferrable air rights from the adjacent landmarked Springs Mills Building at 104 40th Street back in December, according to the New York Post. Without restrictions or having to tamper with any existing zoning guidelines, the project will move ahead with construction starting in 2012 and should be ready for occupation in 2014.

Great news! I did read on the last page the developer was still considering whether or not it would require an anchor tenant, so I'm assuming with this news it has decided it will build it without one? Probably a dumb question.

And from the look of it it won't be very tall obviously, but it will certainly be a very welcome filler, and with some high quality glass could be a real beaut. Bryant Park is already probably my favorite place to hang out and just look around at all the different types of skyscrapers, and this will certainly only add to that.

I walk throught that area a lot, there's not much that stands out as far as filler goes, but this will be a nice addition. There will be a nice touch at street level too.

There are also the two projects on W40th on the south side of Bryant Park.

It's also a matter of time before the building just north of it gets a new facade.
http://www.archpaper.com/uploads/ima...6th_ave_01.jpg
http://www.archpaper.com/uploads/ima...6th_ave_01.jpg

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/13/re...ref=realestate

Square Feet | The 30-Minute Interview
Tommy CraigPublished: November 10, 2011

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/...icleInline.jpg

Interview conducted and condensed by

VIVIAN MARINO

Q What does your job at Hines entail?

A My principal role is to think about value-creation opportunities, to manage risk, and to really advance the firm’s reputation in New York.
...

Q How many projects are you working on now? A We’re just finishing a project in the village, One Jackson Square. We’re working on 1045 Sixth, our Bryant Park project. We’re working on the MoMA mixed-use project; and for that project we just secured a special permit and are now actively engaged with prospective equity partners. We have a fourth project that we’ve just been selected on in Lower Manhattan for a residential project — 56 Leonard.

Q Tell me more about Bryant Park.

A We just announced that in the last 60 days. It’s a project that we’re doing in partnership with Pacolet Milliken Enterprises. We created a design, secured control of the site and we’re now moving forward to secure an equity partner, which we expect to do by the end of the year.

We’re actively leasing, working with CBRE, and we hope to be in a position to begin below-grade work next year. If we’re under way next year, we can deliver occupancy by year end 2014.

We think of it as a boutique-scale office building — 28 stories — and we think that’s actually its great strength. It’s under 500,000 feet, it’s in Midtown so it’s a real counterpoint to other projects. It will offer users in the size of 150,000 to 250,000 feet an identity and a presence.



Q How would you say the New York market was faring?

A The New York market on a comparative basis has the strongest fundamentals of any market in the country. The strength in the capital markets would be hard to overstate. There’s been very positive job growth this year. A long-term outlook of New York continues to favor it in ways that very few other cities can compare, mostly because it is really a destination for talent around the globe. We haven’t seen a major user leave New York for over 15 years....

Since this is such a small building (i.e., 450k sf), it seems that it's being built on spec. like Minskoff's 51 Astor Place, which is 500k sf. I guess with a tower this small, a developer doesn't need a pre-construction lease to secure financing, as this likely will be filled with a bunch of small users of 10,000 to 200,000 sf.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/busines...Lr3B4rqWEcx0UK

NY Post"Reality Check"
Steve Cuozzo

15 Feb 2011


There’s a new name for 1045 Sixth Ave. — oops, Avenue of the Americas — the 28-story office tower to be built by Hines and partner Pacolet Milliken Enterprises on the west blockfront between 39th and 40th streets.

It will be 7 Bryant Park, an “address” just approved by the Manhattan borough president’s office. It’s the second project to enjoy the association after 1 Bryant Park, the Durst Organization/Bank of America’s tower at 42nd Street.

The tower designed by Pei Cobb Freed & Partners boasts triangular notches at its northeast corner that offer park views to tenants and seem to gracefully nod to the park from the outside.

CB Richard Ellis titan Mary Ann Tighe, who heads up the leasing team, said, “We believe Bryant Park has become a high-end district in its own right, like the Plaza District.”



Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/busines...#ixzz1dm8Uk8fm

So I'm assuming were looking at a Spring 2012 groundbreaking?

That seems accurate based on the NYT article posted above.

By the way, something is going on at the building just north of here. Maybe it's getting a new facade.

www.pacoletmilliken.com

http://www.pacoletmilliken.com/bryan...renderings.php
http://www.pacoletmilliken.com/bryan...renderings.php
http://www.pacoletmilliken.com/bryan...renderings.php

Hines recently posted a new website for this tower, which has a nice video too.

http://www.7bryantpark.com