Rendering of development at 298-308 Lafayette Street, view from Houston Street toward the west. Image Credit: CookFox Architects.

Commissioners embrace plan by CookFox Architects that would replace gas station, garage, bar and billboard. On April 9, 2013, the Landmarks Preservation Commission approved the issuance of a certificate of appropriateness for the construction of a new, seven-story building at 298-308 Lafayette Street. The three lots face the Puck Building and are at the corner of Lafayette and Houston Streets in the SoHo-Cast Iron Historic District Extension. The plan calls for the demolition of three existing structures that currently occupy the site. This includes the demolition of the Puck Fair bar, Houston Car Care, a BP gas station, and a billboard. The new building will be used for office and retail space.

Developer Marcello Porcelli, President of LargaVista Companies, said the plan utilizes the site for “a higher and better use” than its current occupants. Porcelli said “we were extremely selective in choosing the right steward for this design process,” and that sustainability was a “guiding principle” of the project.

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Size and visibility of proposed rooftop additions reduced over course of several meetings. After multiple revisions, Landmarks unanimously approved Kushner Companies’ proposal to build rooftop additions on the Puck Building at 295 Lafayette Street in SoHo. The individual landmark occupies a full block on the south side of Houston Street and consists of two sections designed by architect Albert Wagner. The first section, built in 1886, rises to seven stories, and a nine-story rear extension was built in 1892.  (read more…)

Penthouses would add six apartments to landmarked commercial office building. On September 20, 2011, Landmarks considered Kushner Companies’ proposal to build two, two-story additions on top of the landmarked Puck Building at 295 Lafayette Street. The red-brick Romanesque Revival building occupies the entire block bounded by East Houston, Jersey, Mulberry, and Lafayette Streets. Landmarks designated the Puck Building as an individual City landmark in 1983.

Jared Kushner, principal of Kushner Companies, testified that the proposal was part of an ongoing effort to refurbish and modernize the Puck Building, which his family purchased in the 1990s. Cas Stachelberg, an architectural historian representing Kushner, testified that the building had undergone significant alterations. Stachelberg noted that the building had been seven stories when it was built in 1886, and a nine-story extension was added to the southern facade in 1893. Four years later, nearly 50 feet of the building’s northern facade had to be removed to make way for the opening of Lafayette Street. Stachelberg gave examples of other significant buildings from the time period that had vertical additions, such as the Cooper Union and Carnegie Hall, and he cited the American Museum of Natural History’s Rose Center for Earth and Space as an example of contemporary design added to a 19th-century structure.  (read more…)