It’s been eight months since construction first broke ground, but the massive, Thomas Heatherwick-designed centerpiece of Hudson Yards Public Square and Gardens, known as The Vessel, has finally topped out. With Untapped offices located only a few blocks away from the installation site, we were able to closely follow the progress of the $200 million and 150-foot-tall climbable structure, dubbed “New York’s Eiffel Tower.” It was only a few months ago that we spotted scattered pieces of the structure sitting along the High Line. Now, developers Related Companies and Oxford Properties Group are celebrating a major construction milestone, and all there’s left to do is to install the “final details of the structure, as its paving, balustrades, lighting and cladding come together,” said Heatherwick in a statement.
Image via Related-Oxford
Image via Related-Oxford
Noted as “one of the most complex pieces of steelwork ever made,” the 600-ton Vessel features 154 interconnecting flights of stairs with 2,500 individual steps and 80 landings. The last of the structure’s 75 pieces was installed yesterday. The components were pre-fabricated in Italy, and were transported from the Port of Newark to the Hudson construction site.
Image via Related-Oxford
Image via Related-Oxford
The Public Square and Gardens at Hudson Yards, designed by Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects and Heatherwick Studio, is slated to debut in 2019. When completed, the five-acre site will present 28,000 plants and 200 mature trees. As the centerpiece, Vessel will hold up to 1,000 visitors at one time, and provide connections to the High Line and Hudson Park & Boulevard, Curbed NY reports.
Next, check out our previous coverage of the Vessel in Hudson Yards.
