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Hudson Yards, New York
Yeah there's room at the top, pretty cheap for the view, but the vertical drop made the skyline askew
It’s March 15, 2019. It’s a Friday. The weather today has been unusually warm for March, with a high temperature of 75 degrees. Those welcome warm temperatures are not going to last- tomorrow it’s only going to be 50 degrees and with such a temperature drop you can plan on getting some pretty strong thunderstorms this afternoon and tonight. And today at 5pm you have plans that are going to keep you outside. Months and months ago you blindly reserved a free timed entry pass for the Vessel at Hudson Yards not knowing anything about the weather or the future. And nothing is going to stop you from going, unless, of course, it’s closed due to nearby lightning strikes.
March 15th was a pretty big day for Hudson Yards. It was not just the premiere of Vessel (not the Vessel) but also the opening of the plaza and the shopping mall. After years and years of watching the construction, of trying to peek through the barriers, of wondering what the space would be like when it was finished and when it was all finally ready to be explored.
Vessel is 150 feet high and it was designed by Thomas Heatherwick, famous in London for the Rolling Bridge, double decker buses and that crazy fun Olympic Torch from 2012. Vessel does not fit easily into any category- it’s not really a building or a sculpture or a monument- and the experience of seeing it and climbing it changes constantly. Perhaps this complexity is why Vessel and Hudson Yards were savaged in architectural review after architectural review when they first opened. Most of the criticism was disappointing and downright lazy, complaining more about structural problems with Manhattan real estate and capitalism and blaming Hudson Yards for all of it, as if it is the only place in Manhattan that is a playground for rich people.
This is a view about halfway up looking to the open river and isolated thunderstorms raging in Hudson and Bergen Counties in New Jersey, storms that would luckily bypass Manhattan just when I needed them to. You can also see the western yard, which will eventually block those open river views with a forest of apartment towers designed by high end architecture firms.
With my free timed entry ticket in hand, I finally entered Vessel and this is the first thing you see. At the center, a patch of the ground is backlit with blue lights, you can see some of the reflections on the upper levels. On one side, a crazy ass elevator slowly goes up and down and above you a few of the Hudson Yards towers peer over into the open sky view.
This image is almost the mirror image of the last picture. Looking up it all seems so open, but looking down at the center it all seems so solid. If you had never heard of Vessel and were given these three views (down, up and across), you might understandably think you were looking at three different buildings. Or sculptures. Or monuments.
This is a close up of the crazy ass, custom elevator that hugs one side of Vessel, allowing accessibility to ever other landing in just that part. The entire experience is really all about stairs- there are 154 different staircases- although somehow it doesn’t feel like you just climbed 15 stories into the sky. The design, with landings and views in all directions, provide natural breaks making all that climbing feel not all that bad.
Back to that crazy ass, custom elevator. It is definitely one of a kind, with a fascinating cog rail system that seems to change directions all the time and is really fun to watch in action. And after it opened, Related came to terms with the US Government to make ADA improvements- they will design and install a one of a kind lift system that would make the entire upper perimeter of landings accessible for anyone with a disability.
As you rise up higher and higher in Vessel, everything around you starts feeling lighter and lighter. Views open up even more, and it’s damn near impossible not to stop and take pictures at every landing and every turn.
This is the north view along Hudson Park and Boulevard, a wedge shaped public space that starts in front of the Shed and eventually stretch all the way up to 42nd Street. In a far off future, this will feel like a wider Park Avenue, with a continuous street wall of towers framing both sides of the park for a good eleven blocks or so. Already the two empty lots next to 30 Hudson yards (the glassy tower on the right) are scheduled for two massive commercial office towers designed by Norman Foster and Bjarke Ingels.
Like I said, it’s damn near impossible not to stop and take pictures at every landing and at every turn.
Finally, after all of those 154 flights of stairs (really, it’s not that bad) we’ve reached the top., where things start to feel a little more impossible. Here, up against the background of David Child’s Equinox Tower helpfully reflecting Manhattan on the right side and New Jersey and the Hudson River on its left, first day visitors feel like they’re floating up and over the plaza and the mall and everything new that is suddenly worth exploring.
One last picture of the Vessel, um, I mean Vessel. Looking up from the plaza you get reflections in the bronze stainless steel curved panels that give Vessel it’s color. The surprise reflections that you get in these panels are half the fun of ascending and descending it. Even after you have grown accustomed to the view, it’s still easy to be surprised by an unexpected reflection of the plaza or another building or the city or, on one level only, yourself.
