With One-of-a-Kind, Award-Winning Terrazzo Features
Challenged to transform the lobby of a 1926 manufacturing district building into a welcoming entrance for sophisticated tenants, Architecture Plus Information (A+I) turned to terrazzo.
“Terrazzo is at once incredibly durable and incredibly varied and beautiful,” said Jennifer Wichtowski, Associate at A+I of New York City. “It has a timeless character, but can be given a modern edge, making it extremely versatile and flexible.”
The location, 225 Varick Street in New York City’s Hudson Square–now home to technology and media companies, offers tenants 12 floors of loft-like office spaces with expansive city views.
Not Your Traditional Lobby Space
A terrazzo planter in the Hudson Square lobby
The new design honors the industrial aesthetic of the 1926 building. Palladiana terrazzo composed of hand-fractured marble pavers and Venetian terrazzo with brass accents embellish the exposed columns and concrete. The installation and the terrazzo contractor, Yorie Tile and Terrazzo of Allentown, PA, was recognized by the National Terrazzo & Mosaic Association (NTMA), with a 2020 Honor Award.
Benches, planters, and steps in striking Palladiana terrazzo demarcate lobby circulation and social space. Textured curves of the space-defining raised platform demonstrate the artisanal craftsmanship.
“Rather than pass-throughs in the morning and evening, A+I designed productive spaces that act as social activators, lending value to the buildings in which they are placed,” Wichtowski said.
Bookmatched Optical Illusion
The precast terrazzo steps are all handmade, with book-matched marble treads and nosings. Designed to render the tread to appear to be a two-inch thick slab, the innovative design is actually produced with a 3/8-inch thin-set epoxy terrazzo system. Richly textured Venetian aggregate in sizes one to three is troweled between the pieces of marble. The vertical Venetian terrazzo panels with two-inch brass inlays and radius corners around planters and benches are precast.
To expedite the installation process, the marble pavers were fractured and mounted offsite at the terrazzo contractor’s precast facility, then set on numbered sheets. On the job site, the interlocking sheets were reassembled like pieces of a puzzle and adhered to the substrate. Finally, the entire floor was ground and polished to 1200-grit as a monolithic whole.
The consensus is that the original challenge was met. The lobby, thanks to innovative design in terrazzo, has been transformed into a welcoming space that invites tenants and guests to linger, relax, mingle, and meet, reflecting the evolving locus of work beyond the traditional office space.
Close up of Palladiana Terrazzo
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