525 West 52nd Street

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A complex of three modernist residential buildings, one on 52nd Street (for which the entire project is named), and two others across a central courtyard, stretching farther west along 53rd Street. The first two were completed in 2017, with the taller one facing 53rd Street. It stands 230 feet and 22 floors, while the south building on 52nd Street rises 14 floors. Designed by Handel Architects, these have 324 market-rate apartments and 81 affordable units, along with a 13,486-square-foot courtyard in between them. To the west of the north building, the 12-story 540 West 53rd was completed in 2019 (described separately in individual tag).

The 14-story building on 52nd Street is clad in red brick with some darker, grey brick highlights. The upper floors are divided into 12 bays, with six double-wide bays at the ground floor, which has a grey granite water table. Most of these bays are plate-glass storefronts below grey-brown metal louvers, with recessed glass-and-metal double-doors set to one side of each. The main entrance is in the 2nd bay from the east, in a recessed, double-height opening with glass infill; it has a revolving door next to a traditional glass door, both below a metal canopy. On the upper floors the bays have uneven double-windows with narrower east panes and wider west panes with thin, grey-brown metal framing. Each has a stone sill, brick lintel, and a vertical band of dark-grey brick along the east edges only. The 2nd-floor windows are taller than those above. The western of the two bays above the entrance is the only one to have grey metal spandrels between floors. While all the bays to the left of it set back above the 11th floor, this one rises one floor higher, and then extends a window band to the west for two bays. The 13th floor above it then extends west for one bay, and the east end of the facade rises all the way up to the 14th floor. The rest of the top floors extend to the west (the 12th floor reaching the end of the building, and the others each stopping a little shorter), set back, with glass-and-metal curtain walls. There is a large, metal-clad mechanical bulkhead on the roof.

The taller 22-story building on 53rd Street is clad in matching materials. It is tallest at the east end, while the west side steps down floor-by-floor and somewhat resembles the prow of an ocean liner. Like the south building, the ground floor bays are twice as wide as those on the upper floors, and the main entrance is in the 2nd bay from the east, with the same design. The 2nd & 3rd floors also have the same smaller bays, with uneven double-windows, but there are metal spandrels between these two floors in these bays. There are a total of 18 bays. Above the 3rd floor the facade is broken up into alternating groups of two bays with 2-bay-wide recessed areas, creating a folding pattern along the facade. The recessed areas have glass-and-metal cladding, with metal spandrels. The brick piers at the non-recessed bays frame the eastern one in each pair, while the western one is subsequently wider and wraps around the corner, with a short side pane leading back to the recessed areas. The easternmost pair of non-recessed bays sets back above the 16th floor, while the next pair sets back above the 15th, the next above the 13th, and the western twor above the 12th, with the glass recessed areas also setting back at similar levels.

The set-back top floors are clad in a curtain wall of glass and grey metal, in the same design as the recessed glass sections below. They rise to the 22nd floor along the east half of the facade, and then begin the series of step-downs, one floor at a time, to the west. Each floor ends in a large terrace at the west end, enclosed by a glass railing and fronted by slanted metal louvers.