Essex Crossing’s second phase gets its first renderings

Two new buildings, designed by Handel and CetraRuddy, are revealed

It may have taken a while—half a decade, even—to get there, but since the Essex Crossing megaproject got its groundbreaking in 2015, progress at the Lower East Side site has been swift. A walk around the Seward Park Urban Renewal Area these days reveals four buildings, comprising the first phase of the megaproject, in various stages of completion.

And as those buildings—which will bring hundreds of apartments, many of them affordable, to the neighborhood—near the finish line, developer Delancey Street Associates (a collaboration between L & M Development Partners, BFC Partners, and Taconic) is gearing up for phase two. That stage of development will comprise three buildings, bringing hundreds of apartments, office space, and the Market Line to the project.

And now, new renderings, provided exclusively to Curbed, offer a glimpse at what that second phase will look like. Isaac Henderson, the project manager for Essex Crossing, also provided some new details on when to expect these myriad buildings to show their faces to the public.

The new images show off the buildings known as site three and four, which will be designed by CetraRuddy and Handel Architects, respectively. Site four (which is all the way to the left in the rendering above) will be home to part of the Market Line, along with 263 rentals (half of which will be affordable) and office space. Site three, in the middle of the rendering, will have market-rate condos, along with more office space, ground-floor retail, and yet another piece of the Market Line.

"Architecturally, three and four are really strong—they help complete what we're doing along Delancey," says Henderson. "Looking at two, three, and four together, you see the culmination of taking abandoned, vacant parking lots, and replacing them with three very diverse and interesting buildings."

The final building shown is site two—part of the first phase of the development—which was designed by Handel and will have nearly 200 rentals, with approximately half being deemed affordable.

Moso Studio

From left to right, sites two, three, and four, with the West 8-designed park in the foreground.

The new renderings also shows off one of the megaproject's biggest public-facing pieces: a 15,000-square-foot park, designed by West 8 (the firm behind the hills on Governors Island), which could debut as early as this fall. The park sits at the base of 145 Clinton Street (the rental formerly known as site five), and will have bring plenty of much-needed greenery to the area, along with seating and a children's play area.

The last piece of phase two is an affordable apartment building for seniors that will replace the old warehouse on Essex Street that was one home to the Lowline Lab.

Meanwhile, phase one (which also includes 242 Broome Street, the SHoP-designed condo; 145 Clinton Street, which will be home to Trader Joe's and Target; and 175 Delancey Street, with 99 senior apartments), things are moving right along, with residents expected to begin moving into the site by the end of the year. According to Henderson, the market-rate rentals within 145 Clinton will also become available sometime this year.

Much of the retail being offered there is also expected to debut in the first half of 2018, meaning that by this time next year, Essex Crossing which actually begin to look like a real neighborhood, rather than just bits and pieces of buildings under construction. "Hopefully a year from now, we'll have seven of the nine Essex Crossing buildings under construction," says Henderson.

• Essex Crossing [Official]
• All Essex Crossing coverage [Curbed]