Image courtesy of Curbed.com

According to the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, the 70 Washington Street building is 80% sold out. Last month, the largest sale at 70 Washington was the purchase of two penthouses (my guess is the combination of an E and F line, based on the total square footage) by someone who plans to combine the two units for a total square footage of 2,720. I can’t confirm that the purchaser is Busta Rhymes or any other celebrity, but one of the units is the clock face duplex apartment that was featured on Curbed back in April, 2006. The total value of the duplex penthouse with two terraces and corner views of Brooklyn Bridge, Lower Manhattan, and the Statue of Liberty is $3.42 million (that’s $1261/sq.ft.).

Compare this to the article from the NY Times in June, 2006 on the former executives at Goldman Sachs and J. P. Morgan Chase paid $5.8 million ($1211/sq.ft.) for two adjoining apartments at 1 Main Street in Dumbo, Brooklyn. The two units, with a combined 4,790 square feet, have views of the East River and Manhattan. In 1998 when 1 Main Street went on sale, the two apartments sold to separate buyers for a total of $1.55 million (only $324/sq.ft. for both units).

Not a bad return, but it isn’t likely that we’ll see the same ROI 8 years from now in 2014, which would make the 70 Washington Street combined penthouse at $12.8 million or over $4700/sq.ft.

Shootings for movies and tv shows are pretty frequent in Dumbo. The new ABC show Six Degrees was shot on location in Dumbo a few weeks back. Today, on Washington Street there’s a shooting for the feature film I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry (out in 2007) starring Adam Sandler, Dan Aykroyd, Jessica Biel, Steve Buscemi, and Kevin James. It looks like they’ve been shooting in Prospect Heights, Park Slope, and other locations in Brooklyn/Manhattan according to the IMDB message boards.

Rascal provided this photo who reported “Everyone and everything you see in this photo is part of the shoot–there were hundreds of extras–big set-ups.”

Thanks Rascal for the tip and photo!

I noticed last week that the 70 Washington Street building sales website has been updated with their own domain name (www.70washington.com). According to the website, these Dumbo apartments are 70% sold. Has anyone been to the sales office for the latest info?

New York Public Library has a nice collection of old photographs of New York streets. There are some Brooklyn photos from the Dumbo and Vinegar Hill areas in the 1800′s and early 1900s. The area was known as Fulton Landing where the ferry dropped off passengers from Manhattan. Once the Brooklyn Bridge was built in the 1883, followed by the Manhattan Bridge in the 1909, Fulton Landing became a commercial area and Brooklyn Heights the residential area. To put things into historical perspective, take a look at the before and after.

For the first in the series of “Dumbo Streetscapes Then and Now”, we are looking north on Washington Street with York Street in the foreground. In the old photo, circa 1926, you’ll notice that 70 Washington Street and 81 Washington Street (Thompson Water Meter) buildings are still around, but the dark brick building on the near right corner of York and Washington is gone, to make way for the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. Notice the old overpass between the Gair buildings past Front Street, no longer there. Also the electric wires have now moved underground.

1926

August 26, 2006

{New York Public Library photo of Washington Street and York Street}

There was a mention of Helen Brough’s sculptural installation at 70 Washington Street in Dumbo, “Emulated Flora” in today’s New York Sun.

It was completed in May for the new condominium conversion of 70 Washington Street, a sprawling block-wide warehouse in DUMBO.

The piece was commissioned by David Walentas, the property mogul who owns most of the area. Ms. Brough (b.1966) had been a participant of the Triangle Artists’ Workshop’s first residency program, generously hosted in 2002 by Mr. Walentas at 70 Washington before renovations began. This makes “Emulated Flora” a rare, happy link between the artists who helped put the neighborhood on the map and the affluent residents basking in its upward transformation.

The work consists of dozens of lasercut Plexiglas shapes — in a variety of colors and arranged in parallel lines — that are suspended from, or bolted to, a mirrored ceiling extending over the whole lobby. Each element is around 18 inches high and hangs well overhead. Some of the shapes are also themselves cut from sheets of mirror. From the street, and then more intensely within the lobby, one senses row upon row of translucent plastic, curvaceous shape, and chirpy, soft, nursery color. The layering puts you in mind of rows of scenery in a theater’s eaves.The mirroring doubles the perceived depth of the work, giving a soaring sensation of light and color above.

The controversial installation was discussed last November on curbed.com. Most people seem to hate it, but we know Walentas is not afraid of controversial art.

{An Explosion of Color, and of Bridal White, New York Sun, August 17, 2006}