The 24-story residential condominium building now under construction at 250 East 49th Street on the southwest corner at Second Avenue has changed its name from Splendido to The Alexander.
The East 49th Street Development II LLC, of which Alexander Gurevich is a principal, is the developer of the 88-unit project that has been designed by Sydness Architects of which K. Jeffries Sydness, a former partner with John Burgee Architects, the successor firm to Johnson/Burgee Architects, which was founded by Philip Johnson and John Burgee, is the principal.
The building will have a 24-hour doorman and concierge, an Equinox fitness center, a landscaped roof terrace, a cold food storage room, and private storage.
Apartments will have 11-and-a-half-foot ceilings, individually controlled heating and air-conditioning, Subzero refrigerators, granite countertops, Miele washers and dryers, privacy shades, Viking gas cooktops and ovens, Kohler Hourglass tubs and Jerusalem Gold limestone bathroom floors and walls.
The building has several unusual layouts. Unit C on floors 3 to 5, for example, has an 18-foot-8-inch-by-7-foot-4-inch balcony that faces on curved walls in the living rooms and bedrooms. Unit C on the sixth floor has 1,044 square feet of interior space and 132 square feet of balcony space and 1,096 square feet of terrace space and its main rooms have curved walls facing its exterior spaces. Unit C on floors 7 through 22 have curved window walls.
A prior design by Sydness Architects for the site, which formerly was occupied in part by the Box Tree Restaurant and Inn, called for a 31-unit, 20-story, mid-block tower that would have been cantilevered over the low-rise building immediately to its east and the cantilevered portion would have been supported by an asymmetrical array of struts and the north and south facades of the tower would have floor-to-ceiling windows with frosted glass balustrades in a random pattern across the front of the building.
The site was subsequently expanded to include the frontage at the southeast corner of 49th Street and Second Avenue.
The new design, shown at the right, has a red terracotta-clad base/podium from which rises a curved glass curtain wall flanked at the south and west portions of the tower by beige terracotta-clad facades. The lower section of the development "respects the street wall of the residential block comprised primarily of townhouses and lower scaled buildings," according to the Sydness Architects website.
The lower two levels of the base will be retail and entered from the avenue and the residential entrance will be on 49th Street. "The remaining three levels of the podium section contain larger apartments with terraces that cut into the podium revealing the curved tower as it rises from the ground. The curved section of the tower will have ceilings higher than 11 feet for "expansive views uptown."
The building is expected to be completed late next year.
The East 49th Street Development II LLC, of which Alexander Gurevich is a principal, is the developer of the 88-unit project that has been designed by Sydness Architects of which K. Jeffries Sydness, a former partner with John Burgee Architects, the successor firm to Johnson/Burgee Architects, which was founded by Philip Johnson and John Burgee, is the principal.
The building will have a 24-hour doorman and concierge, an Equinox fitness center, a landscaped roof terrace, a cold food storage room, and private storage.
Apartments will have 11-and-a-half-foot ceilings, individually controlled heating and air-conditioning, Subzero refrigerators, granite countertops, Miele washers and dryers, privacy shades, Viking gas cooktops and ovens, Kohler Hourglass tubs and Jerusalem Gold limestone bathroom floors and walls.
The building has several unusual layouts. Unit C on floors 3 to 5, for example, has an 18-foot-8-inch-by-7-foot-4-inch balcony that faces on curved walls in the living rooms and bedrooms. Unit C on the sixth floor has 1,044 square feet of interior space and 132 square feet of balcony space and 1,096 square feet of terrace space and its main rooms have curved walls facing its exterior spaces. Unit C on floors 7 through 22 have curved window walls.
A prior design by Sydness Architects for the site, which formerly was occupied in part by the Box Tree Restaurant and Inn, called for a 31-unit, 20-story, mid-block tower that would have been cantilevered over the low-rise building immediately to its east and the cantilevered portion would have been supported by an asymmetrical array of struts and the north and south facades of the tower would have floor-to-ceiling windows with frosted glass balustrades in a random pattern across the front of the building.
The site was subsequently expanded to include the frontage at the southeast corner of 49th Street and Second Avenue.
The new design, shown at the right, has a red terracotta-clad base/podium from which rises a curved glass curtain wall flanked at the south and west portions of the tower by beige terracotta-clad facades. The lower section of the development "respects the street wall of the residential block comprised primarily of townhouses and lower scaled buildings," according to the Sydness Architects website.
The lower two levels of the base will be retail and entered from the avenue and the residential entrance will be on 49th Street. "The remaining three levels of the podium section contain larger apartments with terraces that cut into the podium revealing the curved tower as it rises from the ground. The curved section of the tower will have ceilings higher than 11 feet for "expansive views uptown."
The building is expected to be completed late next year.
Architecture Critic
Carter Horsley
Since 1997, Carter B. Horsley has been the editorial director of CityRealty. He began his journalistic career at The New York Times in 1961 where he spent 26 years as a reporter specializing in real estate & architectural news. In 1987, he became the architecture critic and real estate editor of The New York Post.
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