Affordable housing rooftop

Design Wild Creates Verdant Sanctuaries for Affordable Housing Residents

All New Yorkers deserve a nature and peace. This is what we’re working towards through our long-standing collaboration with the non-profit Clinton Housing Development Corporation (CHDC). Together, our work has yielded beautiful, innovative, and functional green spaces in public locations and for lower-income residents throughout the Midtown West/Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood. On the rooftop of the 200-unit building at 540 West 53rd Street, there is a feature usually associated with lux high-rises: an expansive terrace with sweeping views, intimate gathering areas, and lush, abundant greenery. We conceived the space overlooking the Hudson as a refuge for the building’s 350 residents, including a rooftop garden capable of withstanding the intensity of the full sun and high winds blowing 12 stories above the streets.

We have worked for several years with the construction development team on a new twelve-story apartment building constructed in Midtown Manhattan.  The new building opened in 2020 and now standing at its full 12 stories, contains 100% affordable apartments for New Yorkers in a wide range of incomes. 

This building is not just affordable, it’s also gorgeous.

Next Phase of the Project

The final tier of the West 53rd Street project will be an adjacent park and interior event space that will be accessible to building residents and locals alike. Adam’s Garden, named for a community figure, has been in the works since 2017 and is set to open in the fall of 2024. The 50 x 100’ garden will include a stone terrace, stream, native plantings, and a cow head sculpture rescued from a famed slaughterhouse in the district half a century ago. Locals will have a low barrier to entry to the garden, receiving a key with a $2 deposit from the local community board.  Adam’s Garden is the latest Design Wild project that ultimately aims to connect everyday New Yorkers to nature, carving out green islands in unexpected places to increase livability and promote community. “With the intensity of our city and the stress of our current world,” Nagel says, “our gardens offer a moment of respite; a second to catch your breath, time to notice the beauty of a flower, a bird playing in the stream, and ultimately a reminder that we all belong here on earth.”