53W53 is best known to the public as the MoMA Tower for its location on the last unoccupied parcel of the Museum of Modern Art campus. The purpose of the project is to extend and complete MoMA’s existing building collection with a residential tower on top of three new floors of galleries. The singular spires of the tower give the museum a long-awaited signature in the skyline and house 140 unique condos above the streets of Midtown.
 
Manhattan’s skyline is a bar chart of individual economic success stories that translate collectively into the city’s famously iconic image of power and unity. The zoning laws that have been shaping this image for over a century are a unique set of ideas that have since been emulated worldwide. Building a landmark tower in Midtown Manhattan means becoming simultaneously a part of this tradition and an exception to it.
 
The design of 53W53 harnesses the sculptural uniqueness and inherent rationality of the site’s zoning envelope, taking inspiration from Hugh Ferriss’ famous drawings of early Manhattan towers. 53W53’s spire-like profile is indeed the result of reinterpreting the city’s heliomorphic zoning principles in their original intent to allow the most possible daylight into the streets. Because of the irregularity of its various zoning lots and their individual regulations, the tower’s silhouette is as singular as the piece of land it stands on. Its receding stealthy geometry makes it surprisingly discrete from close-up on 53rd or 54th Street. Seen from Central Park, the bridges and most locations on the river banks, the tower’s spires stand out as a recognizable icon that marks MoMA’s presence in the city.

The structural glazing façades of the tower are overlaid with grey metal plates that map out the grid of structural elements on the inside behind the glass. The diagonals of the structural wind bracing follow the simplest load path down to the foundations, producing an irregular asymmetrical diagrid around the entire building that functions like a giant triangulated truss and permeates the entire building. As the residents inhabit this diagrid, their home becomes a part of the bigger picture of the tower and its iconic role in the city.

In 2007, Bertram led the winning competition entry for the MoMA Tower (53W53) in New York. The New York Times critic Nicolai Ouroussoff hailed this project as “the most exhilarating addition to the skyline in a generation.”

Bertram Beissel was the design director and partner in charge of 53W53 for Ateliers Jean Nouvel. 

STATUS Under Construction – Occupancy 2020/2021
LOCATION 53 West 53rd Street, New York 10019, USA