Moneymaking Machines #12: One Hundred

They don’t always have to be supertall superslenders. We are in St. Louis, Missouri, U.S. and looking at a residential project called One Hundred, by Studio Gang. It’s the kind of thing I try to discourage students from dreaming up. It’s eye-catching in a scale-confounding kind of way but so much effort has been expended for very little in return. The main shape-making idea seems to be to have the splayed walls create balconies for the residential units on every fourth floor. A secondary idea is to cram shared amenities (mainly sofas on the inside and sun lounges outside) into the less marketable part of the building adjacent to the roof of the car park.

I’d like some more information on how the building’s leaf-shaped plan and tiered massing maximize its performance, reducing overall energy load and increasing occupant comfort but this first diagram below is all there is. It’s hard to believe architects still draw those airflow arrows. The building has its long sides facing west to the park and east to downtown. This is not great for solar gain but the self-shading due to the tiered massing and the angled glazing will go some way towards reducing that. The leaf-shaped plan that gives each unit a corner window might contribute to occupant thermal comfort because of better ventilation caused by the wavy blue arrow. but unfortunately the side glazing panels are fixed.

NextSTL is a website “Covering the Future of DEVELOPMENT, TRANSPORTATION, and PUBLIC POLICY in St. Louis.” comments on the project and shows drawings submitted to a 2012 December 16 public meeting. There are about 90 or so public comments and a variety of viewpoints you don’t normally get to see. The article, titled “Stunning Skyscraper by Studio Gang Unveiled for Kingshighway Site” is generally gushy but one person questions the need for such a small parking garage to have three access points reducing the availability of curbside parking on West Pine Blvd. There are some interesting comments on funding and subsidies.

The parking layout originally submitted (top left, below) is pretty horrid, particularly that two-way 90° corner on the ramp half landing. The building is pushed to the west of the site because the car park pushes the elevators westwards. Having the building on that side is probably not a bad thing to do if/when the surface car park adjacent on the east is redeveloped. Nevertheless, the lobby is cramped and connects to two retail units but not the indicated café. We can see why, but it’s still odd. The revised plan on the right (from Dezeen) has one less access to the car park but now a loading bay maybe 15m from the intersection. There’s now almost no car parking at ground level but there is a trash room, various rooms for utilities as well as bicycle parking that was probably at the suggestion of the local authority. The lobby is less cramped and is generally better. The apparent need to have a drop-off inside the car park means it has to have its own way out at the price of six car parking spaces. This might be something cultural at work. Maybe it’s a custom to say “You go on up while I park the car”. Or maybe Uber drivers have to drop passengers as close to the elevators as possible? Perhaps there is valet parking at this porte cochere? The car park ramps still look like they have that nasty corner as well as parking for nine cars along the ramp. No thanks. The ramps have moved one structural bay to the east and this won’t make it easy to navigate the above five levels if we calculate that the amenity level on the roof of the car park is level 7. This level 7 roof is only partial as one third of the level 6 car park is open and overlooked by two apartments on level 7. These car parking levels are disguised from the street by an aluminum screen that we never get to have a very good look at. Aesthetically, I guess, it works as the plantpot to the plant above and I can’t believe I just wrote that. Anyway, design changes developments such as these are what happens when trying to get something built. I understand. It’s called feedback and it’s helpful. In Medial-land, there’s just too much we never get to know about and it’s a shame. We believe the thing we’re presented with is what was always meant to be when there’s usually some agonizing story behind its genesis. [c.f Architecture Myths #20: The Villa Savoye]

I get the bit about making every apartment into a corner unit. These balconies may be a diversion when you look at them from street level but they’re a bad idea from every other way you can look at them and, again referring to the illumination and airflow diagram above, there are too many ways they can be looked at. “The tiered massing and leaf-shaped plan” conspire to make those balconies for 25% of the apartments perfectly overlooked from directly above and obliquely above by the occupants of the other 75%. Moreover, they’re also overlooked horizontally by their neighbors each side.

I can’t believe this concept made it past initial review. It doesn’t matter now. It’s built and is going to be there at the end of St Louis unless it’s dynamited for maintenance neglect but, since this is market rental, I doubt that’ll happen. The units will be sold off once the market inflates and an attractive return guaranteed.

The architects seem to think it’s important to not have any balcony dividing partitions above balustrade height. The splayed aluminum panels are interesting not because they counter the tiering but because they reduce the amount of glazing and the perception of being visible at balcony level from the adjacent balcony. Those leafy corners aren’t doing anyone any favours.

Here’s what we have so far. We don’t get to see how the car park was resolved. The middle image below shows how those balconies for the lucky 25% are going to be partitioned but let’s move on to the typical floor. The image on the right below is for level 14.

This is the development website and all the apartments are rental. (“First month free!”) The image below is from the availability page. Unit 3302 is a studio and rents for $2,340/month. Unit 3306 is a 2-bed and rents for $3,825. A 1-bed is around $3,000/month. These prices are for the 33rd floor but I don’t know for when. The building was completed in 2020.

The apartment sizes are based on the structural bay width of three car parking bays (7.5m or approx. 25’) and which can have what looks like one 4m wide living room and one 3.5m wide bedroom. Standard. The 3-bedroom unit on the left has a tiny living-dining area for maybe four persons – not that any four co-habitants necessarily dine or do anything together. None of the living areas are very nice. I thought that maybe it’s the work of an architect of record but Jeanne Gang was quoted as saying “by experimenting with the geometry of the facade and refining the apartment layouts, we were able to make every apartment into a corner unit perched above the park and city” (Designboom) If a living room can’t have light from two directions, then giving it a corner window isn’t a bad thing to do but here, those secondary sight lines cross other people’s primary ones.

This St. Louis lettings website https://www.apartments.com/one-hundred-above-the-park-saint-louis-mo/67vfehs/ and also tells me the building is now known as One Hundred Above The Park. It has floor plans, 51 photos with many of the common areas, and some of bathrooms and washing machines that you might want to see if you were thinking of living there. Be mindful of realtor perspective however. The site also has current prices for the about 10% of the 351 apartments that are available. One bed apartments now rent for up to $6,000/month and the most expensive apartment is over $10K/month. If we conservatively assume the average rent for 320 apartments is around $4,000/month, this is about $1.5 mil./month.

I dislike what this building represents more than I do the actual building but the two aren’t unrelated either. The outside is probably what it needed to be and the inside no better than it needs to be. This difference in priorities is most evident at those leafy corners, now with fixed glazing so airflow doesn’t carry your conversations.

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No revisits this week.