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Chatham Towers

Chatham Towers, George Shimamoto's brutalist masterpiece for Kelly & Gruzen, represents a high point of New York City postwar housing. Designed in 1959 and built between 1963 and 1965, the twin 25-story towers were revolutionary in many respects, not least their poured-on-site concrete construction.

 

There are 240 residential units, five per floor, with all but the studio apartments having double exposures; the site also features a striking private garden designed by Paul Friedberg, and is built on top of a two-story parking garage. Half the floors feature balconies, giving the towers their distinctive syncopated rhythm, and all of the apartments are fitted with revolutionary oversized windows with Venetian blinds sandwiched between the two panes of the double glazing. In contrast to the serpentine brick-built Chatham Green on the other side of Park Row, Chatham Towers has a building-wide steam-powered HVAC system for all apartments, preserving the clean lines of the towers. 

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More information about Chatham Towers can be found at CurbedDocomomo, and NYC Urbanism

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