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Leonid Slonimskiy

@slon1slon

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Founding partner @kosmos_architects
Teaching at @headgeneve
Visiting professor at @columbiagsapp

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A small collection of New York’s infrastructure seen over the last summer. What strikes me most is their extraordinary physical proximity here. Huge bridges, highways, railways and other infrastructural objects run directly alongside apartment windows, shops, streets and public spaces, becoming an almost inseparable part of everyday urban life.

The first, quite dystopian image, illustrates it very directly – the Maspeth Municipal Incinerator, a cathedral-scale industrial apparatus with huge pipes rising literally out of a sea of gravestones on Mt. Zion cemetery.

🏭🪦 taken in New York, New York by @slon1slon

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This summer in New York, I started collecting moments that show the way the city — entirely constructed of stone, steel, and concrete — breathes, moves, and exhales through its infrastructure and beyond (including the iconic orange-and-white striped steam pipes and sprinkler caps, of course).

P.S. Despite having seen them in hundreds of photos and movies, I didn’t know that these orange pipes are part of a piped steam system built in 1880-s that supplies steam to many buildings in Manhattan. The steam is used to heat and cool buildings, as well as for cleaning and disinfecting. taken in New York, New York by @slon1slon

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🏰🗿

Some of the most interesting spaces, recently visited in New York belong to transport infrastructure – those buildings, atmospheric and brutal at the same time, are located in different peripheries of the city and were less known to me. First – a 38-hectare – large Brooklyn Army Terminal was designed by Cass Gilbert (the author of Woolworth Skyscraper) and looks like a scenography from a sci-fi movie with an abandoned train and staggering balconies.

Second – a beautiful concrete insect sitting on top of the Trans-Manhattan Expressway by Pierluigi Nervi – the George Washington Bridge Terminal.

And the third one is a Motorgate Garage, capable of hosting all the resident’s cars of the Roosevelt Island. Prefab masterpiece, designed for growth and disassembly, with a facade reminding japanese temple wood joinery, but actually is a more elegant and simple copy of Boston’s City hall by the same architects, Kallmann & McKinnel. taken in New York, New York by @slon1slon

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2 months ago

Casual Churches

An interesting quality of many churches in New York—and, I imagine, in the United States in general—is their super-ordinary, casual appearance in terms of architecture, location, signage, and aesthetics. Often squeezed into a street front between a barbershop, a liquor store, and a copy center (1st picture; or topped with a steakhouse (picture 2), their modest appearance makes them feel like everyday, accessible places rather than imposing institutions.

That does not mean there are no impressive and elaborate cathedrals—there are, and plenty of them—but these neighbourhood churches, despite their modest appearance, have an important social presence. They function more like social clubs, bars, or markets, where people can meet, exchange ideas, and hang out, with religion forming part of their daily lives. taken in New York, New York by @slon1slon

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Beautiful and brutally rough Tracey towers were originally designed by Paul Rudolph as a luxury condo, but were finally built in 1972 as a subsidized living. Yet they kept the the quality of the original intent in its complex shapes, materials and generous public spaces. Prefab elements with elliptical windows on the parking create a particularly cool space.
P.S. The last image is my personal “Turner” made thanks to the dirty Subway window :) by @slon1slon

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I am mesmerized by the micro architecture of New York’s food delivery electric bicycles. The custom additions, made by the food couriers vary from neighborhood to neighborhood and from one ethnic group to another. The additions range from very pragmatic such as: huge hand pockets from scotch tape and plastic; ventilators; multiple Iphone holders; multiple locks and chains against stealing; to purely decorative and spiritual such as: Jesus and virgin figures; skulls; manga characters etc.
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The coolest device was the tiny umbrella an argentinian food delivery courier used over his two phones: one of them showed Google Maps, while another one streamed a live Argentina–Egypt match. ⚽️ taken in Harlem by @slon1slon

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A striking New York urban anomaly: the “holdout” buildings. These are historic low-rise structures whose owners refused to sell to developers (for various reasons), and newer massive high-rises were built next to them. Sometimes the contrast is so radical, that it is hard to believe that these adjacencies are real; yet they bring a unique feeling of the centuries-old scale the city used to have. P.S. Posting this from P.J. Clarke’s bar opened in 1860s (last photo) taken in P.J. Clarke's New York by @slon1slon

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Transformation of an old Mallorcan townhouse in a village by the sea.

Due to its isolated location, the project relied on reusing as much as possible from the existing house, as well as from the local storage of leftovers of construction material. The existing tiles were recomposed as a large-scale terrazzo; existing door cut in half and reused as a folding one; windows and facades repaired. Oil funnels and ceramic rooftiles became lampshades; a discarded cast iron manhole cover became the base of the existing stove; and rebar caps were used as doorknobs. In the kitchen, traditional mediterranean chain curtains screen the otherwise exposed products and appliances. Paint was used as a minimum resource to recompose the space.
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At the end the only addition really needed was a pulley to bring materials and supplies up the house.
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Project is a collaboration of KOSMOS Architects and Blanca Gardelegui @bggardelegui
Photos by @luisdiazdiaz taken in Serra de Tramuntana by @slon1slon

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4 months ago

Incredible interior garden; rather a forest already. 12 Stories, 53 m high. Ford Foundation interior atrium by Kevin Roche with elements of tecture — traffic cones and plastic film replacing the reflective pond, and perfectly blending in with brass rails, corten walls, red berries, tree trunks and Dakota granite. taken in Ford Foundation Gallery by @slon1slon

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A unique typology of self-built huge balconies in the orthodox Hasidic jewish neighborhoods in New York. They are used during the Jewish holiday Sukkot. These staggered balconies zig and zag down otherwise quite dull apartment facades. On those balconies, “sukkahs” are built: huts that Jews traditionally spend time in during the holiday. According to Jewish law, for a sukkah to be considered kosher, it must—among other things—have a roof that is open to the sky. To follow this very specific rule, the apartment owners came up with an idea of zig-zagging their balconies. That allows Hasidic Jews build kosher sukkahs with roofs unobstructed by other balconies above them. taken in Williamsburg by @slon1slon

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9 Years today since Nomadic Wedding Party @bggardelegui taken in Zürich, Switzerland by @slon1slon

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An incredible infrastructural underbelly of the century-old 125th Street station viaduct
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Поразительное, построенное более века назад, инфраструктурное “подбрюшье” виадука станции метро на 125-й улице в Нью-Йорке taken in Harlem by @slon1slon

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