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600 W. 125th Street

Columbia University, Manhattanville Campus


Renzo Piano Building Workshop (2019 - Present)
New York, New York


Photograph of North Facade
Photograph of North Facade


Commission: to design a new building for graduate student and faculty housing


Project Status

Complete

Press Release

Columbia University ︎︎︎
RPBW ︎︎︎
600 W 125th is the latest addition to the Manhattanville Campus, Columbia University’s vision for a 21st century campus integrated into the fabric of New York City. The project builds on key characteristics of this master plan including a transparent and inviting ground plane known as the Urban Layer, a refined industrial material palette informed by the context, and a high benchmark for sustainability.
Housing graduate students and faculty apartments, 600 W 125th adds a critical programmatic ingredient to the existing academic facilities. By providing places to live, the project meaningfully adds to the new campus’ center of gravity and creates a 24/7 vibrancy. The 34-story building becomes a natural beacon for Manhattanville Campus, announcing its presence to the nearby Morningside Campus and broader urban context of New York. 
Responsibility
  • Project Manager
  • Schematic Design through Construction Administration (All Phases)


Design Team
Design Architect
  • Renzo Piano Building Workshop
Architect of Record
  • Cetra Ruddy Architecture
Consultants
  • LERA (Structure)
  • AKF (MEP)
  • VDA (Vertical Transportation)
  • Atelier Ten (Sustainability)
  • ARUP (Acoustics)
  • Syska Hennessey (IT/Security/AV)
  • Langan (Civil)
  • Mueser Rutledge (Geotechnical)
  • Tollotson Design (Lighting)
  • Kuhlmann Leavitt (Signage)
  • Elizabeth Kennedy (Landscaping)




Perspective Rendering, Aerial View Perspective Rendering, Aerial View Perspective Rendering, Street View Campus Section


The project houses 142 graduate and faculty student apartments over approximately 184,000 GSF, reaching a height of approximately 400’. From the outset, it was clear that the project massing should be as sensitive as possible to the surrounding context. The new building breathes, leaving spaces in-between and allowing for a porosity of light and air with the surrounding neighborhood. At the street level, the building is elevated on slender columns to create a feeling of lightness and floating above the public realm. Upon this sits the podium, a five-story element that defines the street wall and creates a gateway into the campus from the southeast by mirroring the Forum facade across the street. From here, the tower steps back and fragments further in plan and in elevation as it rises according to the sky exposure plan, floorplate organization, and the desire to reduce the visual impact and the shadow of the tower within the neighborhood.


Photograph from North West Photograph from South East East Facade Close Up

This fragmentation continues with vertical notches that cut through the facades. The top of the tower is a rhythmic composition using the building systems as vocabulary. In the end, the project’s north-south orientation and its east-west shape maximize the views for residents towards the Hudson River to the West and the East River, at the same time mitigating the tower’s presence from Broadway.
The facade is clad in Glass Fiber Reinforced Concrete (GFRC), pigmented a subtle blue-grey and polished to a reflective sheen. This material choice creates a luminous skin that, at certain times, makes the building appear to dissolve into the sky. The scale is reduced through smaller GFRC panels with curved corners and rhythmic vertical ribs that capture the sun's movement.


Photograph from North Photograph from South East Photograph from West Photograph from East


Facade Studies
Facade Studies
Detail Photograph from South EastDetail Photograph from South East


The ground floor reincorporates the previous McDonald's as a corner tenant. Tucked to the west, the lobby's vibrant orange accent walls are part of a dynamic wayfinding system throughout public areas. Levels 2 and 6 feature amenity lounges, a fitness center, and laundry facilities, all connected to terraces with greenery. The 33rd floor, Columbia’s tallest common space, hosts a double-height library offering contemplative views in every direction.


Street Facade Photograph Level 6 Amenity Terrace Level 33 Amenity Lounge Faculty Apartment


In continuing the ambitious sustainability goals of the Manhattanville Campus, 600 W 125th Street is currently tracking certification of LEED v4.0 gold with notable features includes a high-performance façade with approximately 60% opacity, optimized equipment efficiency, limited gas usage to achieve long-term carbon emissions reductions, enhanced Clean Construction program, vegetated roofs and stormwater detention. The project is also pursuing Fitwel Version 2.1 Multifamily rating, with a target of 2 stars, reflecting the building’s responsibility toward occupant health and well being in addition to environmental stewardship.


Photograph from North West
Photograph from North West


With the completion of 600 W 125th Street, the Columbia Manhattanville campus principles of lightness, transparency, contextual sensitivity, and sustainability are infused with a new vitality of residential life. The project is more than a beacon for the new campus; it's a place designed to truly connect future faculty and graduate students to their academic purpose and the urban life around them.






Professional Projects


Boca Raton Center for Arts and Innovation


Renzo Piano Building Workshop (2023 - 2024)
Boca Raton, Florida




Rendering of the Piazza - Courtesy Renzo Piano Building Workshop


Commission: to design a new performing arts venue for the city of Boca Raton


Project Status

Concept Design Complete
The Center for Arts and Innovation brings a new vision for cultural and performing arts venues, combining an open and flexible educational and partnership space, a dynamic black box theater, and a large transformable main venue. The main venue, provided with state-of-the-art infrastructure, can transform to suite everything from traditional ballet to a rock concert to a drone race. 
Equally important to the design is the civic role of the building. Located at the culmination of the pedestrian Mizner Boulevard, a square Piazza is envisioned as a generous public space. The interior ground floor and lobby are porious continuations of this pedestrian experience. Finally, the belvedere, a floating box high above the photovoltaic roof line serves as a symbol from afar and offers dramatic views of the city. 
Responsibility
  • Architect
  • Concept Design


Design Team
Design Architect
  • Renzo Piano Building Workshop
Architect of Record
  • Davis Brody Bond / Page
Consultants
  • (Undisclosed)




First Floor Plan Second Floor Plan Third Floor Plan Roof Plan


South Elevation
South Elevation


The volume of this three-story building is largely determined by the performing arts nature of the program. With a significant interior venue and back of house support space that does not want natural light, the architectural form is articulated as a floating mass. Elsewhere, as in the public spaces, office and educational space, the mass recedes and natural light is abundant. Above the mass is a continuous photovoltaic roof structure providing significant energy production for the project. Finally, this massive roof is visually juxtaposed by the intimate Belvedere rising above, a public living room for the city.   


Diagrammatic Model Perspective Rendering of the Belvedere - Courtesy of Renzo Piano Building Workshop


The new Piazza serves as the culmination of the active pedestrian life of Mizner Boulevard and becomes the fulcrum around which the new project is centered. In addition to providing a new space for spontaneous public life, the Piazza can host farmers markets, pop-up festivals, or outdoor ampitheater performances. For large events in the main venue, large operable doors would allow the crowds to extend out into the Piazza as well.

Perspective Rendering of Main Entrance - Courtesy Renzo Piano Building Workshop Perspective Rendering of Main Entrance - Courtesy Renzo Piano Building Workshop






Professional Projects


Melrose Branch

New York Public Library


Mitchell Giurgola Architects (2016-2019)
Bronx, New York



Exterior Photograph
Exterior Photograph


Commission: to design an addition and renovation of a branch of the New York Public Library


Project Status
Complete

Award
2025 SARA New York Design Awards, Award of Excellence

Read More
New York Public Library ︎︎︎
The Melrose Branch, originally built in 1914 and designed by Carrere and Hastings, suffered from a severe fire in 1959 that burned the upper floors. Surviving until now with only modest reconstruction and repairs, this branch was overdue for a major redesign.
Similar to how the punched windows below continue in a regular pattern across the facade, the newly proposed window wall rhythmically runs across the street facades. It is capped with a deep aluminum fascia above to create a modern-day cornice.   
Responsibility
  • Project Designer
  • Schematic Design through Construction Documents


Design Team
Architect
  • Mitchell Giurgola Architects
Consultants
  • Superstructures (Restoration)
  • LERA (Structural)
  • JFK&M (MEP)
  • Cerami (AV/IT)
  • Cline Bettridge Bernstein (Lighting)
  • Conversano (Code)
  • IROS (Elevator)




162nd Street Elevation Photograph - Previous Morris Avenue Elevation Photograph - Previous 162nd Street Elevation Photograph - Completed Morris Avenue Elevation Photograph - Completed


The existing condition needed another floor addition not only to satisfy growing programmatic requirements, but also to restore the proportions of the building closer to the balance and composition that the original neoclassical design had. 
Mullion caps extend deep outside the glass, further accentuated at the round internal columns that coincide with the window spacing below. The existing punched windows are replaced with large clean windowpanes with minimal mullions.


162nd Street Elevation Drawing - Existing 162nd Street Elevation Drawing - Additon Morris Avenue Elevation Drawing - Existing Morris Avenue Elevation Drawing - Addition


Section Perspective Perspective from East


First Floor Second Floor Third Floor


The lower two floors housing the Adult and Teen reading rooms follow the NYPL Carnegie Design Standards developed by Mitchell Giurgola and used on the Hunts Point Branch, including white oak floors and custom books cases with built in benches at windows. The spaces are furnished with custom white oak reading tables and chairs. A three-story steel and black terrazzo stair connects the main reading rooms in a simple white volume punctured by vertical strip LED lights to accentuate the lofty space.


Children's Room Interior Photograph Children's Room Interior Photograph



Early in the design process, the top floor reading room was reserved as the children’s floor to offer abundant natural light and the opportunity for lower sills to see out of.  The children’s reading room also features a wood slat ceiling to convey the warm wooden interiors to the street.






Library Projects


Hunts Point Branch

New York Public Library


Mitchell Giurgola Architects (2016-2019)
Bronx, New York



Exterior Photograph
Exterior Photograph


Commission: to design a renovation of a branch of the New York Public Library


Project Status
Complete

Read More
New York Public Library ︎︎︎ 
Located in the Bronx, the Hunts Point Branch, designed by Carrere and Hastings in 1927, is a beautiful example of the refined neoclassical approach. The parti is simple yet effective, two grand reading rooms stacked on top of each other with ancillary spaced moved to the back of the site. The team at Mitchell Giurgola was tasked with restoring the existing facade including window replacement, a new ADA compliant entrance ramp, and repairing and repointing of the brick facade. 
On the inside, new white oak floors will be complimented with surrounding custom white oak bookshelves, built in window benches, custom white oak chairs and reading tables, and black terrazzo stairs. Once completed, the much needed overhaul will offer state of the art technological resources, meeting spaces, and beautiful reading rooms for Adults, Teens and Children, all in a clean and contemporary design that pays homage to the century old library traditions. 
Responsibility
  • Project Designer
  • Schematic Design through Construction Documents


Design Team
Architect
  • Mitchell Giurgola Architects
Consultants
  • Superstructures (Restoration)
  • LERA (Structural)
  • JFK&M (MEP)
  • Cerami (AV/IT)
  • Cline Bettridge Bernstein (Lighting)
  • Conversano (Code)
  • IROS (Elevator)




Southern Boulevard Elevation - Existing
Southern Boulevard Elevation - Existing
Tiffany Street Elevation - Existing
Tiffany Street Elevation - Existing


Southern Boulevard Elevation - Restored
Southern Boulevard Elevation - Restored


The new Southern Boulevard Elevation reflects a return to the historic double hung wood windows and features a new limestone entrance ramp. The reading room employs traditional wood shelving wrapping the room with huge new windows to match the original. The space is filled with a thoughtful mixture of computer workstations, long communal tables, and clusters of lounge chairs. A new glass vestibule is introduced at the entrance, simple in form so as to not detract from the grand volume of the room.


Interior Photograph
Interior Photograph







Library Projects


Theater in Connecticut


Mitchell Giurgola Architects (2016-2019)
Norwalk, CT




Inerior Rendering


Commission: to design an addition and renovation of a college theater


Project Status
Ongoing
Norwalk Community College’s East Campus began with a long-pitched roof building, followed by a aggressive theater renovation that cut into the existing geometry, setting up a contrasting octagonal parti. The Mitchell Giurgola renovation resolves what was a pair of interlocking octagons in plan by introducing a straight street facade. The infill space in plan becomes much needed additional back of house support space, and the street facade takes on a pared down, minimalist aesthetic. 
The interior theater renovation is extensive, only select existing structure will remain. The rake of the seating and shape of the auditorium is straightened out to be more rectangular, allowing for more seats and a more regular acoustical shape. Coupled with state-of-the-art theater equipment and an LED backlit aluminum wall, the new theater will be a dramatic surprise to many who enter, and it opens the doors to much more serious performers for the school. 
Responsibility
  • Project Designer
  • Schematic Design through Construction Documents

Design Team
Architect
  • Mitchell Giurgola Architects
Associate Architect
  • Fletcher Thompson
Consultants
  • Ysrael A. Seinuk (Structural)
  • Fletcher Thompson (MEP)
  • Theater Projects (Theater)
  • Dirtworks (Landscape)
  • Alfred Benesch (Civil)
  • Arup (Acoustic)
  • Jaffe/Holden (Acoustic/IT/AV)




Longitudinal Section through Theater
Longitudinal Section through Theater
Aerial Axonometric Showing Existing Roof Design and New Street FaçadeAerial Axonometric showing Existing Roof Design and New Street Facade


The theater itself underwent a complete transformation. In addition to increasing the seating count, the sightlines were significantly improved by increasing the rake of seating. New acoustic paneling was introduced on all perimeter walls, and a LED backlit, water-cut aluminum feature wall was added to create a sense of drama from the new entrances. The existing open truss roof structure spanning over the theater seating was meticulously documented and reused as part of the new theater design. 


First Floor Plan Second Floor Plan


The back of house addition includes: a larger stage support space with adjacent loading dock, a pair of new make-up and private dressing rooms, a conference room, and a separate stage support entrance. The scope of work also includes a reorganization of the traffic flow and a new landscape design for the main theater entrance.  







Professional Projects

Architect, Artist, Writer


Architect, Artist, Writer