Town House Residence
Mac Dougal / Sullivan Historic District
New York, United States Of America
Residential Townhouse Building
5.556 gross SF
Property Cost `12.5 Million / Construction Cost: 3.2
Million
1 unit
The MacDougal–Sullivan Gardens Historic District is a
small historic district consisting of 22 houses located at
74–96 MacDougal Street and 170–188 Sullivan Street
between Houston and Bleecker Streets in the South
Village area of the Greenwich Village neighborhood of
Manhattan, New York City.
The district was designated a New York City landmark
in 1967 and was added to the National Register of
Historic Places in 1983.
Rare, intimate, modern, and magical, this extraordi-
narily unique residence is a special piece of New York
City in the Village’s landmarked Historic District. The
row-house was built in 1844 and remodeled in the
neo-Federal style by Hyde and Joannes in the 1920’s.
Formerly owned by Vogue Italy’s Chief Editor, Franca
Sozzani, the new owners wanted to personalize this
residence by completely renovating it into a practical,
colorful residence for a family of four, all the while inhab-
iting the space at the same time which is a logistical
challenge given its narrow twenty foot width.
At the time of writing this RFP, we are currently under
construction in Phase Two of a Three Phase design
and build process. The first challenge was to create ad-
equate storage space for a family of four. The previous
owner lived alone, and so storage needs were minimal
and the design aesthetic matched the sparse program.
The new couple, with two children, needed a Mud-
room and an Entry Powder Room with plenty of storage
space. Since the Basement Level off of the Street was
fourteen feet tall, an entry platform with and eight foot
ceiling was designed with hidden hatches to allow
access to four foot storage space below, effectively
duplicating the square footage of the space for storage
while also giving them a functional place to store shoes
and boots, hang bags and coats.
Another immediate challenge was the lack of a laundry
room on the premises. A former vestibule area on the Third
floor was converted into a full laundry station, complete
with a clothes steamer, washer, dryer and slop sink in
lava stone. The laundry station was designed to be hid-
den in natural oak cabinetry with built in low voltage light-
ing. Plumbing was heavily modified to accommodate the
change and two children’s bathrooms that shared the wet
wall were completely refurbished with skylights and all new
fixtures in brass and colored tadelakt wall and floor finishes.
While performing the work, the roof was found to be
leaking with several structural members needing to be re-
placed. The structure was repaired and a completely new
insulated roof meeting the strictest Passive house Stan-
dards was implemented. A new porcelain pedestal paver
system was added as a finish over the new roof. The new
roof assembly has a 30 year warranty.
An existing Solariam on the roof was also found to be
problematic and full of leaks. We designed a new enclo-
sure to be thermally broken with high performance triple
pane glazing and UV protection, allowing the solarium to be
cool on hot Summer days.
in addition to the roof replacement, the hydronic radiator
heating, hot water boiler and air conditioning systems were
all failing, causing the owners to have frequent water and
HVAC outages in the building. The gas powered radiant
hydronic system was eliminated and replaced with a VRF
heat recovery electrical heat pump system making the
building more reliable and efficient.
Phase Three will include gut renovating three floors for a
new kitchen, pantry and living on level one. Level two will
be fully gutted to renovate the Master Bedroom, Master
Closet and his and hers Master Bathroom. The Cellar will
be gut renovated into a Gym and guest bathroom.
All images by KURV Architecture ©