NEGROPONTE APARTMENT
20 West Street   New York, NY
 
Communicating Surfaces
The apartment on the top floor of the former Downtown Athletic Club looks out over New York Harbor, its south and west facing windows provide both spectacular views and intense sunlight. Modulating these passages in and out and the tensions developed in their intersections forms one set of surfaces - formed louvers. The stone floor and wall form second surface, the containing one. A third set of surfaces resolve the fluctuations of use, it is an office, conference room for six with video and an apartment.  The first set of surfaces are milled louvers, they block and allow passage in multiple directions in varying intervals they open views to the harbor’s traffic and monuments while blocking the direct sunlight during the heat of the day; they trap light and provide a rippling glow at the periphery.  It is a residence, working, and meeting space.  
The third fluctuating surfaces act as folding, pivoting, and sliding containers and supports, they form a perimeter of storage, conceal and open the bed, desk and reflect and allow light into the most recessed spaces.