The Durst Organization’s Far West Side “superblock” near the Hudson River has, or will soon have, nearly 1,400 rental apartments, an eight-screen cinema, a glamorous restaurant and a farm-to-table food market.
Next, we’ve learned, they’ll soon be joined by a branch of one of America’s most distinguished hospitals — a tenant that would have seemed far-fetched when Douglas Durst bought the land in 2000 with plans for an all-commercial-use complex.
The Hospital for Special Surgery is taking 65,000 square feet on four “community-use” floors at Frank 57 West, the newest of Durst’s three mostly residential buildings on the long block bounded by 11th and 12th avenues and West 57th and 58th streets, real estate industry sources said.
HSS is widely regarded as the nation’s leading orthopedic hospital, with its main facility on East 70th Street and satellite locations elsewhere in Manhattan, as well as in Queens, Long Island and Connecticut.
The new space is expected to be used as an outpatient clinic.
Although the deal has been struck with Durst, sources said it can’t be announced yet because HSS still needs certain technical approvals by city agencies.
Durst’s representative declined to comment when we asked if he could confirm our sources’ claim. Reps for HSS didn’t respond to an e-mail request for comment.
Durst’s Far West Side complex has been called a “superblock,” but that’s misleading.
A superblock usually refers to a single, large block created out of several smaller ones from which at least one cross street is removed — as at the original World Trade Center.
Durst’s parcel is “super” only in the sense that it’s very, very big. The block between 11th and 12th avenues is 775 feet long — nearly the length of four conventional north-south blocks.
It was occupied mainly by a neon sign company, a car dealership, the Copa nightclub and warehouses when Durst bought a 99-year lease on the land from a 19th Century landowning family’s successor firm in late 1999.
Limited by zoning that allowed mostly manufacturing-related uses, he first planned to put up a small office building, a Hollywood-type production studio and a “marquee” auto dealership.
He later considered a hotel and a data center, among other options.
But after helping persuade the city to rezone the block for larger-scale residential use, a relieved Durst switched gears. The site’s three apartment buildings are all-rental with 20 percent of units “affordable.”
His first building, Helena (named for his daughter Helena Rose Durst, a company vice president), opened in 2006 with 568 apartments. The site’s showpiece, VIA 57 — the pyramid-shaped giant with 709 units, designed by Danish architect Bjarke Ingels’ firm — opened in early 2016.
The third building, Frank 57 West (named for Helena Durst’s young son), is where the hospital facility will go. Frank 57, the smallest structure on the block, has 68 apartments as well as retail and community-use space.
A few weeks ago, VIA 57’s glamorous retail tenant, Greek/Mediterranean restaurant Ousia, owned by the Livanos family (Oceana, Molyvos), opened in 7,000 square feet. Opening soon will be a 30,000-square-foot, eight-screen outpost of Mark Cuban’s Landmarks Theatres cinema chain.
And also coming soon to the block is farm-to-table food hall Hudson Market, which will have nearly 10,000 square feet on the ground floor and concourse of Helena.
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