Siegel of GSAA has made a significant impact on the built landscape in New York and around the world

In a distinguished career spanning more than four decades, architect Robert Siegel FAIA has made a significant impact on the built landscape in New York and around the world, with hotels, university facilities, corporate offices, libraries, museums, conference centers, and recreational venues that are used daily by countless people in the United States and abroad. Today, as the founding partner of firm Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects (GSAA), Siegel continues to make news in the New York development community, with four new multi-million dollar projects opening this year. Siegel's most recent work is rooted in an approach formed over 40 years as a design professional. Prior to joining with longtime friend Charles Gwathmey to form their shared practice, Siegel received his BA in Architecture from the Pratt Institute in 1962, followed by a Master of Architecture from Harvard University the following year. On graduating, he rose to become the senior associate in the office of Edward Larrabee Barnes, where he was responsible for major projects including the Crown Center Development in Kansas City and the New England Merchants Bank Tower in Boston. Siegel was also responsible for the overall management of the Barnes office. Siegel and Gwathmey established GSAA in 1968. Throughout their four-decade partnership, Siegel managed the office and handled many large-scale commercial and institutional projects, while Gwathmey took the lead on private residential, art museum, and selected institutional projects. Upon Gwathmey's death in August 2009, Siegel assumed the helm of the firm. The current New York-area projects are among the first to be completed since Siegel took up sole leadership of GSAA. First to be finished is the W Hoboken Hotel & Residences, a 26-story metal and glass building on the New Jersey waterfront that adheres to GSAA's longstanding commitment to create work that fits in its context, but still makes a statement. A two-story limestone base that responds to municipal development guidelines of the historic city of Hoboken in terms of scale and materiality houses public functions, including The Chandelier Room lounge and Zylo Steakhouse, both with panoramic views of Manhattan, W's Living Room with 40' ceilings, a Bliss spa, a wood-paneled multi-purpose ballroom, and multiple conference rooms. Unusual for a hospitality project of this size, developer Applied Companies commissioned Siegel's firm to design not only the building's exterior, but most of the interiors as well. Across the river, the recently completed Soho Mews, at 311 West Broadway, is a residential condominium in New York City's Soho Cast Iron Historic District. The two-building project consists of a nine-story structure facing West Broadway and an eight-story one facing Wooster St., with a shared courtyard mews between them. The 175,000 s/f project offers 5,000 s/f of commercial space, 68 luxury apartments and underground parking. The building's metal and glass facade recalls the evolution of these materials in the Soho Cast Iron Historic District. Yet another of Siegel and GSAA's current projects is the W New York-Downtown Hotel & Residences, a 57-story tower rising just beyond the southern edge of New York City's World Trade Center Memorial Site is currently under construction. The glass-clad tower contains 217 hotel rooms and 222 resi­dences ranging from studios to one and two-bedroom units that offer commanding views of the cityscape, as well as of the water to the east, west, and south. The tower's custom designed glass curtain wall has a subtle grid pattern of white, grey and clear glass panels that visually distinguishes it from surrounding commercial structures. The facade pattern established by the varying glass types is purposefully altered allowing the varying program elements; hotel guest rooms, hotel residences, and residential condominiums, to be expressed on the tower facades. Last but by no means least, GSAA is at work on client Bizzi & Partners Development's 400 Fifth Avenue, a five-star hotel with 214 hotel rooms, including 157 guest rooms and 57 hotel/suite apartments, in addition to 190 luxury residential condos, and amenities including a restaurant, bar, spa, and ground level lounge. The building consists of a tower set back from the street, atop a 10-story podium. The limestone-clad podium is designed to relate directly to the surrounding streetwall buildings including the landmarked Tiffany, Gorham and adjacent 404 Fifth Avenue buildings, in terms of scale, rhythm, and materiality. The design of the 600 foot, precast concrete clad, tower responds to the neighboring Empire State Building two blocks south. The structure is set to be completed this year. Under Siegel's stewardship, Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects is moving ahead at full speed, not only upholding the firm's signature style, but also creating new opportunities for associates to carry on its legacy. Siegel has other projects coming online as well - not the least being the United States Permanent Mission to the United Nations in East Midtown - to say nothing of a broad portfolio outside of the metropolitan area and beyond.