Morgan North Rooftop Park by Tishman Speyer, HMWhite, MADGI, and Shimoda Design wins SARA Excellence Award

Manhattan, NY The two-acre urban park atop Morgan North, the 645,000 s/f redevelopment of what was once New York City’s largest postal distribution center into a multi-use, sustainable property housing creative office space, a multilevel park and street-level retail, has won the Society of American Registered Architects (SARA) New York 2026 Excellence Award in the Landscape Design category.

The project team includes developer Tishman Speyer, landscape architect HMWhite, lead architect Richard DeMarco, AIA, principal of MADGI Design, and design architect Shimoda Design Group.

The SARA NY Design Awards attract entries from across the country and around the world from individuals, firms, and students of architecture and allied disciplines. Awards are granted for a wide range of categories and project types. This year, SARA NY honored 48 professional firms and 24 students with design awards.

Located at 351 9^th Ave., Morgan North encompasses an entire city block between 9^th and 10^th Ave. from West 29^th to West 30^th St. The building varies from a six-story to a ten-story structure along its West 30^th St. frontage. The site originally served as a rail yard for the Hudson River Railroad and then as a United States Post Office distribution center, erected in 1933. Rail tracks previously extended from the adjacent High Line spur into the second floor, resulting in a building with large footprints and increased structural capacities. The USPS continues to operate a mail distribution facility on the cellar level and four lower levels of the building.

Tishman Speyer’s focus on occupant health and wellbeing is exemplified by Morgan North’s new two-acre rooftop park, one of the largest intensive green roofs atop a commercial building in New York City. This tenant amenity is an integral part of the comprehensive adaptive reuse of the building into a 21^st century commercial office building. The building has received a LEED Gold certification and recently won the NYCxDESIGN Award in the Outdoor Space category.

Additional team members included construction manager Urban Atelier Group, structural engineer Active Design Group Engineering, MEP engineer and lighting designer Cosentini Associates, LEED consultant: Vidaris/SOCOTEC and historic preservation consultant Higgins Quasebarth & Partners.

“Morgan North demonstrates that landscape is no longer simply an amenity—it is an essential part of transforming underutilized places into vibrant destinations where people want to work, gather, and connect. This landscape rooftop redefines how people experience work, community, and daily life in the city. We are honored that SARA New York has recognized a project that demonstrates how landscape architecture can unlock the hidden potential of our cities while improving human well-being and reconnecting people with nature,” said Hank White, founding principal of HMWhite, FASLA.

“The 645,00 s/f Morgan North redevelopment exemplifies the continuing national trend of leading commercial property developers and operators focusing on attracting tenants through expansive amenities and well-designed outdoor areas. The SARA Design Excellence Award recognizes the importance of wellness elements in today’s commercial workplace and the creativity of the owner Tishman Speyer and our design team,” said DeMarco.

“Great architecture does not age — it deepens. The Morgan Post Office, born in 1933, carries nearly a century of human story within its walls. Our work was never about imposing something new upon something old, but listening to what the building still had to offer — and answering with equal generosity. At the crown of it all, one of Manhattan’s great rooftop parks opens to the sky — a reminder that nature is not a luxury, but a birthright. Everyone deserves beauty, air and a moment of restoration in the places they live and work” said Shimoda Design Group principal and chief creative officer Joey Shimoda, FAIA, FIIDA.

The total rooftop park size is two acres or 112,750 s/f of outdoor space. The outdoor areas include the 84,750 s/f 7^th Floor Garden Terrace; 30,000 s/f pavilion roof and 8^th and 9^th Floor terraces; and 8,000 s/f 11^th Floor Tower Terrace. The 84,750 s/f roof terrace has been completely reimagined as a landscaped oasis that offers a direct connection with nature, light and air.

The Rooftop Park features a landscape with a planting scheme representative of the planting regions of New York State, designed by HMWhite. Landscape design principles organized the creation of views, while shaping spaces to serve a variety of shared uses and scales of activity. Coniferous hedgerows are arranged to mitigate prevailing winds and are combined with groves of canopy trees to soften and cool harsh sunrays. Further, these landscape placemaking features extend seasonal use.

The woven pathways and the mosaic of varied landscapes create a sense of an oasis in the sky. A variety of spaces are designed for collaborative work, recreation, and quiet inspiration. The ground plane is infused with areas for field games, nature walks, food, beverage, and covers gathering areas for work and play.

The landscape design is composed of a series of layers, which references Northeastern US coniferous woodlands. It starts with the evergreen forest at the rooftop’s northern edge, transitions to a shrubland in its middle, and then flows into a low-lying wildflower meadow at its southern roof boundary. Each space is developed within a visually distinct landscape designed to improve comfort and awaken seasonal sensibilities.

Landscape Architecture Highlights:

• Elevated walkway at perimeter to allow views over parapet

• Varied plant types to create colorful micro-environments that promote varied seasonal experiences

• A variety of raised and sunken areas to create a feeling of natural topography

• Varied outdoor congregation area sizes to promote different types of activities – places for solitude, as areas well as for communal gatherings

Rooftop Park Features:

• Gathering/Yoga Lawn

• Event Open Lawn/Tent ready

• Covered common plazas and trellis structures

• Mini theatre area/Town Hall

• Sunset Terrace

• Vegetable Garden with raised planters

• Abundant and varied furniture groupings

• Decorative lighting design for after-hours activities

• 30,000 RSF glass pavilion addition that anchors the access to the terrace

• Speaker systems throughout

Building Renovation and Expansion

The building’s historic 9^th Ave. lobby has been meticulously restored, bringing its brass-framed entrance doors with an ornamental, double-height transom grille to its original beauty. In addition, Tishman Speyer and its architectural team created two new lobbies, one mid-block on West 30^th St. and the other on the corner of 10^th Ave. and West 30^th St.

The two new lobbies feature rare, oversized 14” wide by 22’ long Douglas fir wood planks that provide a striking, continuous wall surface. Douglas Fir planks are also applied to the ceiling, creating a warm, seamless look to enhance the architecture and lighting design. The 10^th Ave. lobby ties itself visually to the adjacent High Line spur by celebrating four large openings where the trains used to access the building. It features a work/lounge area and an intimate lounge room reminiscent of a vintage railroad café car. These hospitality elements promote the lobby space as a place of social gathering, introducing hospitality concepts into a commercial workplace environment.

Levels 5 through 10 have been renovated with new lobbies, core support rooms, restrooms, stairs and eleven new elevators. The fifth and sixth floors boast floor plates of over 180,000 gross s/f each. The architects introduced three massive 32’ x 40’ skylights along the center of the floor plate, which dramatically transformed the 5^th and 6^th floors, exposing the 5^th floor to enhanced natural sunlight. Further, the volume from the 5^th floor to the top of the interior of each of the skylights is an impressive 46’, which offers unique design opportunities for future customers.

The 7^th floor’s new 30,000-s/f pavilion features two 60-ft-wide clear span bays, a 17-ft-tall steel frame structure and a monumental skylight system. It is the anchor access point to the Rooftop Park amenity space.