254 Front Street

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8-story residential building completed in 2012. Designed by Morris Adjmi Architects, it appears as two distinct facades: a 6-story northern half, and a 7-story southern half (plus a recessed penthouse level on top). Both have a grey metal-and-glass ground floor. The northern section, six bays wide, has almost square windows with grey metal frames set in a red brick facade. The southern section is composed of large mahogany windows and zinc panels bent into a texture that evokes the spirit of brick, the common material of the district. Over time, like the wooden ships and metal sheds of the district’s past, the zinc and mahogany will change in nature, the mahogany becoming lighter and the zinc growing darker and less reflective. The zinc panels extend down on the piers of the ground-level. This section is four bays wide on Dover Street, and nine bays on Front Street. The steel and glass awnings at street level are suspended by multi-story cables and turnbuckles in homage to the adjacent Brooklyn Bridge. The building contains 40 rental apartment units.