A mostly vacant, more than 40-year-old Floral Park office building is being given new life by one of Long Island's leading architectural and interior design firms, JRS Architect, P.C., of Mineola.
The building at 15 Verbena Ave., just south of Tulip Ave., will offer approximately 40,000 s/f of office space following the completion of extensive interior and exterior renovations currently underway. Jackson Development Group Ltd., a residential property developer now located in Bellerose and the owner of the Floral Park building, will use the second floor, approximately 12,000 s/f, for its corporate headquarters. The remaining space is to be leased to professional businesses.
The renovations include a new exterior of red granite, glass and sandstone-hued synthetic stucco, excavation of the building's central courtyard - 14 feet below grade - to provide windows for lower-level offices, installation of a new, high-efficiency HVAC system, insulated windows and Energy Star lighting, a steel and glass canopy suspended over the building's main entrance and new landscaping. The project is scheduled to be completed in March 2008.
"This building has a good balance of materials,' said Kenneth Garvin, project manager and Long Island office manager at JRS. "The warm red granite puts it in context with many of the red-brick buildings in the area." The building's exterior previously was glazed brick. "It was a gray elephant," he said. "It was tired."
Darren Klein, executive vice president of Jackson Development Group, said that before the renovations, the building "looked dated." Now, he said, the building "certainly improves the entire block."
Klein said he and his partners selected JRS because of the firms' extensive experience with exterior renovations as well as their award winning interior design capabilities. "They've done a great job," he said.

The property, within the boundaries of the incorporated Village of Floral Park, was developed as a one- and two-story brick office building in the early 1960s. The main portion of the building has been unoccupied since 1999, except for a recently opened JP Morgan Chase Bank branch that occupies space formerly occupied by Citibank. JRS designed the 4,000 s/f Chase branch, which opened in September 2006. Tags: