Biber Architects

01/01/2021

#HappyBirthday #EvaKoppel , #architect born 01 January 1919
Koppel ran #KKET one of Denmark’s largest arch firms, met her husband #NilsKoppel working at #alvaraalto office, produced work from #brutalist to brick-modern, from #chairs to #lightingfixtures for 60 years. And got credit for it all! (Compare with #ainoaalto #rayeames #denisescottbrown ...)

03/11/2019

Float Park receives honorable mention in the International Design Awards!

https://www.biber.co/architecture/float-park-avenue/

02/14/2019

01/28/2019

01/18/2019

[Movement + Memory]
Our proposal for Food & Retail Units on The High Line uses the shells of former freight box cars. These gorgeous and authentic pieces were once ubiquitous on the High Line. Each set of units would incorporate mechanical movement as part of the storage, unfurling or place making options. Our proposal grapples with the idea of movement, the ghost of physical memory and the iconic imagery of the freight trains. #biberarchitects #highlinenyc

01/14/2019

100 Ideas for NY: 027 - Hydrate

Seems like everyone is carrying a water bottle (and yoga mat) around these days. But paying $2 for bottled water is insulting, wasteful (plastic trash) and never where you need them. Free water seems like another basic human need that the City could easily provide.

Italy has had this solved for a couple of thousand years; public drinking fountains that distribute the finest water for free. In Rome they are called Nasoni (for the big nose shape), in Milan they are Vedovelle (for the weeping sound that the running water makes, like crying widows…I know, Italy). And everywhere else all bottled water is a crowd priced 1 Euro.

NYC water is legendary, but no one wants even a hint of contamination (reasonable) from a public drinking fountain. And really, you should use your hands as a cup (your germs only) or fill a bottle or glass. We don’t want every drink to be a Obama-drinks-Flint-water challenge but solving the cleanliness issue seems simple.

Plus, think of the dogs (and see Save the Trees for the corollary!)

#100ideasforny #biberarchitects Biber Architects

01/03/2019

James Beard was an amazing chef, and the James Beard Foundation is an amazing organization, but the former home of James Beard is somewhat less distinguished when it comes to its interiors, and that would be putting it diplomatically!

The James Beard House, on West 12th Street in Greenwich Village, is a destination for foodies. Nearly every night (well, about 200 times a year) the James Beard House hosts remarkable visiting chefs serving 80 lucky diners from what must be the smallest commercial kitchen in the business.

The interiors are “challenged”, in part by their history and in part by being victims of their own success. There is hardly a moment to rethink any of the spaces, but we were lucky enough to get a tiny window to revamp the top floor Peter Kump Boardroom. It badly needed help.

Wrapped in dark brown grass cloth with a leopard print carpet (yes, they actually make those) and bookshelves filled with a random collection of books, bound magazines and…stuff. The table sat uncomfortably off center from the only distinguished element in the room, a marble clad fireplace from the original townhouse.

We flash mobbed the place, replacing the carpet, painting the grass cloth white(ish) relocating and reconfiguring the table and replacing the chairs. For the bookshelves we ‘curated’ the books by color (after removing their dust jackets) and added nearly a dozen Noguchi lamps for the soft glow the room previously lacked. With planted herbs in the windows and white solar blinds replacing the old venetian blinds finish the space. It now has the light and airy feel beyond its tiny size.

Finally, with the table correctly placed on axis with the fireplace, we topped the mantle with a new Samsung TV that mimics a framed print when it is not being used as a monitor for presentations. It is very convincing, as is the whole room now that its ready for its close up!
James Beard Foundation Biber Architects

01/03/2019

Biber x 2019

Happy New Year!

12/04/2018

When New York's most design-starved residents confront the city government, at a Dept. of Probation office, expectations are very low.

But after a multiyear effort of redesign and (more importantly) policy changes the results have been startling. With writing and poetry programs, employment help and an environment that treats them with respect, they return the favor! 6 years later the space has not only held up, but the design idea has absorbed the ‘information overload’ and it’s been embellished with some remarkable poetry.

#OpenHouseNY #DepartmentofProbation #DesignMatters
#BiberArchitects Lonni Tanner Open House New York

11/26/2018

#idboyawards this Friday! We’re finalists in two categories. Fingers are 🤞🤞

11/26/2018

Timeline Photos

11/21/2018

InterAct Wall and Success Academy Hudson Yards at 2018 Best of the Year Finalists!

We’re happy to announce that we’ve been selected as finalist for the 2018 Best of the Year Award ny Interior Design Magazine for two projects. One for our collaboration with @armada.ny on the InterAct wall (shown) and our project with @successacademy for their Hudson Yards campus (elementary school, middle school, and home of the Ed Institute) We have our fingers crossed and look forward to the event in Nov. 30! #idboyawards

https://www.biber.co/press/interact-wall-and-success-academy-hudson-yards-at-2018-best-of-the-year-finalists-2/

11/21/2018

Success Academy Hudson Yards
Education : Primary and High School Finalist

11/20/2018

100 Ideas for NY

Idea 025 Subway Directionals

“It happens to us all; we get to the top of the subway and spin around trying to orient ourselves. Being oriented is a matter of pride in being a New Yorker, but this is a moment of feeling like a tourist. It’s so easy to solve but no one has ever bothered (are we all too proud to even admit our occasional disorientation?) but a simple “compass rose” set into the sidewalk at the top of each stair would instantly make all of us feel like real New Yorkers.

https://www.biber.co/ideas/025-subway-directionals/

#biberarchitects

11/19/2018

Iris - Our proposal for the 2019 City of Dreams Pavilion on Roosevelt Island. #biberarchitects #cityofdreamspavilion #iris #pavilion

11/15/2018

Open House New York

A handful of spots are available for our #SpacesofJustice tour of the Neighborhood Opportunity Network (NeON) with Biber Architects, taking place Nov 28 at 10am. Join us to experience this innovative community "resource hub" that helps clients navigate probation: https://ohny.org/events/iIoFIDh4fZCW8enlnAIn

11/14/2018

Float Park 2018 Architecture Masterprize Honorable Mention in Landscape Architecture / Urban Design

Float Park received an Honorable Mention in Landscape Architecture / Urban Design for the Architecture MasterPrize!

Check-it out!
https://bit.ly/2T6V90R

#biberarchitects #architecturemasterprize #urbandesign

11/13/2018

100 Ideas for NY

024 - Umbrella Share

Rides shares, bike shares, scooter shares etc. We all seem to be sharing things and it helps to reduce the need for individually owned items, some more personal than others. The item that really seems to be missing from the list and could be really useful as we endure another wet fall is an umbrella share. Instead of buying an umbrella everytime you forget one you can just check one out as you surface from the subway and drop it off outside your building. Or maybe you can hand the umbrella off to another sad looking soul as you cross paths! #100ideasforNY #biberarchitects
https://www.biber.co/100-ideas/

10/19/2018

Hudson Valley House

10/19/2018

VOTE! InterAct Walls by Biber Architects in collaboration with Armada NY

Tomorrow is the last day to vote for our design in Interior Design Magazine's Best of Year Awards.

We collaborated with Armada NY to design and fabricate the InterAct Wall; a set of foldable, rolling curved-corner walls with writeable magnetic surfaces.

The InterAct Walls have the ability to reconfigure informal work areas as small, medium and large groups gathering spaces.

VOTE HERE!:
https://boyawards.secure-platform.com/a/gallery/rounds/17/details/20875
THANK YOU!
#bestofyearawards #interiordesignmagazine #biberarchitects #armadany #desgn Success Academy Charter Schools Biber Architects

10/18/2018

The Hudson Valley House began as an entirely underwhelming cottage-sized structure, originally a one-room schoolhouse with 1940’s extensions, sited on a wonderful piece of 20+ acre property.

We decided to maintain the footprint of the house, more or less, to avoid new foundations and to save the trees that had matured around the house. The moves were essentially vertical.

What began to develop was a set of three units, with matching rooflines and heights. The original school house had almost no head clearance on the upper floor, so we raised that roof to an appropriate height. The ‘matching’ modules began to develop as increasingly modern transformations as they moved north from the original schoolhouse. Our commitment to the original foundations worked until the right, most modern module, which to maintain the width, height and roof line was cantilevered off its existing garage structure base. The exposed, primer red steel beam is the sole gesture to a distinctly modern element.

Cladding the intentionally mismatched modules almost entirely in white, including clapboard, board and batten, flat sheet siding and metal roofing, kept everything unified by color. And as a gesture to the myriad white farmhouses that dot the area, white was a way to blur the architectural dialog going on and presenting a single face to the road, just a couple of hundred feet away.

Our approach respected the original siting and neighborhood context of simple rural structures, revealing itself as a sequence of almost cartoon-like houses arrayed in a staggered composition. While the front is relatively parsimonious with openings, the rear develops a corner window motif to take in the precisely framed views.

Inside there was an existing ground floor that needed to be refinished and made stylistically compatible with the new work above, but it is really the upper floor that defined the new direction. Eschewing sheetrock, all the walls are clad in vertical or horizontal painted wood with sheetrock limited to the cathedral ceilings. Floors are all radiant heated and the lack of air conditioning (and all the ducts that inevitably distort interiors) the kept the volumes a faithful reflection of the actual formal ideas.

Along with the red steel beam there is a tinted square lime plaster wall enclosing the translucent roofed mudroom. It sits as a floating block of masonry within the three module composition.

It is a paradise for a pair of New Yorkers and perfect for a rural getaway.
See more here: https://bit.ly/2RUoyL4
#biberarchitects #architecture #design #hudsonvalley

10/16/2018

The Hudson Valley House began as an entirely underwhelming cottage-sized structure, originally a one-room schoolhouse with 1940’s extensions, sited on a wonderful piece of 20+ acre property.

We decided to maintain the footprint of the house, more or less, to avoid new foundations and to save the trees that had matured around the house. The moves were essentially vertical.

What began to develop was a set of three units, with matching rooflines and heights. The original school house had almost no head clearance on the upper floor, so we raised that roof to an appropriate height. The ‘matching’ modules began to develop as increasingly modern transformations as they moved north from the original schoolhouse. Our commitment to the original foundations worked until the right, most modern module, which to maintain the width, height and roof line was cantilevered off its existing garage structure base. The exposed, primer red steel beam is the sole gesture to a distinctly modern element.

Cladding the intentionally mismatched modules almost entirely in white, including clapboard, board and batten, flat sheet siding and metal roofing, kept everything unified by color. And as a gesture to the myriad white farmhouses that dot the area, white was a way to blur the architectural dialog going on and presenting a single face to the road, just a couple of hundred feet away.

Our approach respected the original siting and neighborhood context of simple rural structures, revealing itself as a sequence of almost cartoon-like houses arrayed in a staggered composition. While the front is relatively parsimonious with openings, the rear develops a corner window motif to take in the precisely framed views.

Inside there was an existing ground floor that needed to be refinished and made stylistically compatible with the new work above, but it is really the upper floor that defined the new direction. Eschewing sheetrock, all the walls are clad in vertical or horizontal painted wood with sheetrock limited to the cathedral ceilings. Floors are all radiant heated and the lack of air conditioning (and all the ducts that inevitably distort interiors) the kept the volumes a faithful reflection of the actual formal ideas.

Along with the red steel beam there is a tinted square lime plaster wall enclosing the translucent roofed mudroom. It sits as a floating block of masonry within the three module composition.

It is a paradise for a pair of New Yorkers and perfect for a rural getaway.

See more here: https://bit.ly/2RUoyL4
#biberarchitects #architecture #hudsonvalley #stanfordville #design

10/14/2018

Animated diagram of our recent design in the Hudson Valley. Stay tuned for more on this project! #biberarchitects #architecture #design #countryhome

10/14/2018

Take this 3D model of our recent project for a spin. Use your mouse/ finger or tilt your phone to get a view of the building from all angles. Full project photos coming soon!
#biberarchitects #design #3Dmodel #countryhome

10/10/2018

Biber Architects turns 8!
Do you recognize all the “8” references? Which ones did we miss?

We opened our new(ish) office on 10/10/10, not just because it’s such a cool number but as an homage to the renowned photographer Julius Shulman who was born on 10/10/10 (1910, that is). In eight years we have amassed an international portfolio including the USA Pavilion at the last world Expo, “greater good” work for clients including the NYC Department of Probation and Success Academy Charter Schools, a proposed new floating park above Park Avenue, restaurants, residences and dozens of other projects.

Our work depends on our clients, our staff and all the allied consultants, builders and fabricators we work with to produce high quality work. Thanks to all of you for the past 8 years of great work!
https://www.biber.co/biber-architects-turns-8/
#biberarchitects

10/09/2018

Biber Architects was hired to design the first Success Academy Education Institute, also known as the Ed Institute.

The Ed Institute is located in a shared building with a Success Academy Hudson Yards Elementary and Middle School on 41st Street and 10th Ave. The Institute is comprised of two large flexible lecture halls, meeting rooms that can be divided into various sizes to meet the program requirements, areas for breakout workshops, and offices for the Institute staff. The Ed Institute runs along the vertical axis through the building allowing for cross pollination to both the active elementary and middle schools. Due to the proximity of the Institute to the schools, educators are able to see how educational techniques are put into practice in the classrooms.

Through the Education Institute, Success Academy is able to educate it’s own teaching staff and nationally through online teaching models, therefore enabling more children to gain access to a great education.

https://bit.ly/2xVxnf8
#biberarchitects

10/03/2018

After school special!
Take a walk in the shoes of the scholars at Success Academy Charter Schools 's newest elementary and middle school in Hudson Yards.

A major feature is the "Utility Express" which runs throughout the hallways. It was designed to create a learning experience for the scholars. It showcases how all the utilities are elaborately intertwined and interconnected and how they branch off to feed each individual classrooms. We were also hoping to inspire some future engineers and designers!

Thank you to all our collaborators! Richter & Ratner Contracting, Pentagram, TM Technology Partners, Robert Silman Associates, WB Engineering PLLC, Tillotson Design Associates, Presentation Entertainment Production and more!
See more:
https://bit.ly/2xVxnf8

10/01/2018

Back to school!
In 2014 Biber Architects worked with Success Academy Charter Schools (SA) to design their first high school. Since creating the first high school Biber Architects has partnered with SA to redesign their middle and elementary schools, creating a design along with guidelines that has been rolled out throughout the network.
In 2017 we completed SA Hudson Yards. Here is a look at the main entrance lobby and grand staircase leading to the school.
#biberarchitects