Semi-Revealed: 16 East 30th Street, 19-Story NoMad Hotel
BY: NIKOLAI FEDAK ON DECEMBER 24TH 2014 AT 7:00 AM
16 East 30th Street, excavation equipment now on-site
While this month’s news about the NoMad boom has been focused on the new residential towers, hotels are also rising in the neighborhood, like 1225 Broadway and 101 West 28th Street. The latter project’s architect is Nobutaka Ashihara, who is also responsible for another tower about to break ground, at 16 East 30th Street.
16 East 30th Street’s terrible on-site “rendering”
There, filings indicate an 19-story hotel will soon rise, and a tipster sent along photos of equipment on-site, as well as “renderings” posted to the facade. YIMBY’s post on developers skirting the rules requiring renderings seems particularly applicable to this site, as the posted images are far from descriptive, and only illuminate a cross-section of the structure.
16 East 30th Street, zoning diagram via DOB
Even the zoning diagram is more illustrative than what’s on-site. In terms of design, Nobutaka Ashihara’s towers tend towards simple and modern, and the illustration seems to indicate something par for the course, and even includes a minor (and likely inoffensive) protrusion. Unfortunately, due to outdated zoning, the building is also set back from the street by 15 feet.
Intimate street-walls flush with the sidewalk are a defining characteristic of NoMad, and as it continues to develop and grow, ensuring that buildings enhance the neighborhood’s urbanity must be a priority.
Unfortunately it does not appear that 16 East 30th Street will offer a positive contribution in this regard, but the sheer scale of neighboring developments will relegate the 199-foot tall project to the shadows. On the same block, Victor Homes will soon build a 50+ story tower where Vinoly has been tapped as the architect, and across the street, an 830-foot tall residential tower will rise at 15 East 30th Street.
Permits list Jasmin Patel of 16-18 East 30th Street LLC as the developer, and while filings lack a room count — only noting that the rooms will be “class B” — the building will total 35,849 square feet.
