SL Green is a real estate investment trust that primarily invests in office buildings and shopping centers in NYC. The commercial landlord owns 1552-1560 Broadway, a combined set of buildings on the northeast corner of Broadway, at the intersection of 7th Avenue and West 46th Street. Located in the prominent Theater District, 1552 Broadway is a historic, landmark building formerly home to the I. Miller showroom and shoe store dating back to the mid-1920s.
When Wharton Properties purchased the site in partnership with SL Green and Newmark, the owners intended to join the spaces to create a 30,000 SF retail opportunity in the heart of Times Square. The building entrance lobby and elevator core needed to be reconfigured in order to make this assembly of spaces feasible. The goal of the project was to connect the buildings to increase retail space while also bringing the historic building back to its former splendor. TPG designed a full restoration of the historic façade on the 1552 building that included recreating and replacing large marble statuary and restoring the bronze lettering signage. Materials were matched to the original, and the storefront was duplicated with extreme care to preserve the landmark building. Since the 1560 address was not a landmarked façade, a new glass curtain wall was incorporated into the new retail storefront.
The interior of the property, which was previously two adjoined brownstone building structures, was replaced with a new steel structure to allow the open retail space. The design team was able to connect the two buildings by bringing down adjacent walls, thus freeing up additional retail space. The new design joined three floors of 1560 to align with 1552 and added a new mid-block building to serve as the commercial entrance to 1560 with a new sky lobby on the 4th floor. Existing elevators were modernized and fitted with a destination dispatch system for a more efficient travel cutting waiting time for the office use population. Following the project’s completion, the I. Miller Building at 1552 Broadway received the prestigious New York Landmarks Conservancy’s Lucy G. Moses Preservation Award in 2014.