Tuesday, July 12, 2016

Baccarat Hotel NYC Architectural Metal and Glass

The Baccarat Hotel NYC is a Five Star Project by architects Skidmore, Owings and Merrill in conjunction with Woods Baggot is located on 53rd Street between 5th and 6th Avenues.
Managed by Starwood Capital Group this project was spared no expense and required  the management and coordination (7 ) seven different architectural metal and glass companies and  (4) four Union Installation Companies. An enormous undertaking taking close to a year and a half.


Above: The 2nd Floor Restaurant and the Ground Floor Elevator Lobby.


Above: Dual Finish Custom Clad Stainless Steel Beams and Ceiling,


Window Portals with Gold, Textured Mirror Cladding. Glass provided by Carvart of New York.



Beyond the mirrored portal you can see the real custom cut  Crystal Curtain Wall, this facade is on the 53rd Street front extending across the total street front and up for (3) three stories. Price tag 4mil.


A 21' high Glass and Bronze Partition adjacent to Bronze Cladding provided by Milgo Bufkin with a polished Nickel-Silver Drop Ceiling.


In the Elevator Lobby is a hung two way Mirror Ceiling with Chandeliers beyond. Above the Chandeliers we installed a Mirror Polished Stainless Steel Ceiling in order to create an infinity effect. When the lights are off the ceiling below the chandeliers is a mirror reflecting the floor space. A very cool function.


In the background you can see a Custom Bronze and Glass Partition installed inside a 2' wide Bronze Surround.


Bronze and Glass double swing doors with Marble Surround, all the the Bronze and Glass Doors are Frameless believe it or not.


Custom made Nickel-Silver door Pulls.


The Bolt together Stairs in the 46th Floor Penthouse, these stairs were done in conjunction  with Maspeth Welding and were installed long after the lift was removed. A very tough load in and staging.


Birds Eye view of Penthouse Stairs.


Above please see the Crown Jewel of the Project titled the Harcourt Wall. This art feature is constructed of HSS Steel, Bronze, Glass, Nickel Silver, real Baccarat Crystal Goblets and programmable LED.  I will soon publish a post focusing on this feature alone as it certainly merits it.

Thanks for visiting MetalGraphic!!!

For free Estimate or Consultation please contact Christian Lewis @ 917-993-0348 or christiansgates@yahoo.com

Friday, July 8, 2016

Manhattan: Hotels and Hospitality, Courtyard by Marriott, South Times Square


                         Christian Lewis: Architectural Metal and Glass,
                Main Entry, Lobby East and West Interior Walls 


Peering upwards toward the heavens the Courtyard Marriott, New York, located on the corner of 54th and Broadway, this 66 story hotel only building seems to touch the sky, it's glass curtain wall reflecting the autumn clouds. As a relative new comer to NYC, I was fortunate to be contracted by the great CNY Builders to perform some of the trickier interior metal and glass work.



Crowned with a striking blue programmable LED display at the last 6 stories hail the  night skyline with crawling pictorials Conceived and created by Harry Gross and his G-Holdings this slender building is to date the highest "Hotel Only" facility in the entire Western Hemisphere.



The 54th Street entrance adorned with #316 marine grade Stainless Steel Cladding and topped with a cantilevered Canopy that carries over a ton of 1-1/2" thick laminated and obscured glass that was manufactured by my favorite East Coast custom glass company Eastern Glass Resources
Below the half circle Interior Illuminated Signage beckons the public into the curvy , leather and glass clad main lobby as viewed below.


Above pictured the West side of the Main Lobby the stacked Reception Desk is placed against a background constructed of  a billowed black leather cladding which adds a stark contrast to soften  the hard edged Revealed Ceiling evoking a feeling of welcome warmth while maintaining a professional corporate image.


My first task in the Lobby was to design engineer the 15' high by 40' long frosted glass Wall feature at the East wall of the lobby, keeping the staggered glass front aligned with the reveals in the ceiling.
Due to it's massive weight of over two tons this feature fell into the structural discipline requiring stamped/sealed engineering as well as a tube steel structure embedded in the wall behind and the structural floor plates seen below. 


Working together with Tony Siffert the Brooklyn Based USS Group Inc. and engineers UrbanTech, I developed these adjustable floor mount plates which could carry a load of up to 3000 lbs each. The process started of course with an accurate lay-out and pilot holes then a 3" core through the marble and mud stopping at the structural slab. The depth of the core ended up averaging around a 3" depth. Next we used the pilot hole to hammer drill a 3/4" hole to a depth of 5-3/8" to accommodate a 5/8", 18-8 stainless steel threaded rod. 


 Once the rod was epoxied in I added an adjustment nut below the circular 1/2" thick stainless plate which was actually perfectly inlaid into the  marble floor. Following that laser leveled  the plates with the nut below allowing us to correct the 1/4" defect in the marble floor. The next process with the leveling/support nut set to height, we poured our pour rock to the height of the adjustment nut achieving a perfectly level plain with the mount plates.




The actual Stainless Steel Steel Structure we built to carry the frosted glass was completely custom built with no catalogue parts. The post are 2" o.d. schedule 80 #304 stainless steel strapped together in groups of 4 with 1/2" x 3" stainless plate stock. The posts are all supported at the top by the tube steel structure buried in the back wall which was a whole other project itself. The posts are welded to the Floor Mount Plates that we described in detail above.



Of course this project had a much larger scope that I  will post  at a later date in parts as this blog is already too lengthy. Stayed tuned for more projects starting with Jarroff Desigm.

Thanks for visiting MetalGraphic !!!

For a free Estimate  /Consultation please contact me at 646-226-9563 or at christiansgates@yahoo.com