THE DELECOR NEW YORK, N.Y. /// By Mason nichols Boasting almost 8.5 million residents and more than 800 spoken languages, New York City is the most populous and linguistically diverse city in the United States. One of NYC’s potentially under-appreciated assets, though, is its architecture. Manhattan’s Upper East Side is dotted with stunning high-rises built in the art deco style, which was popularized in the 1920s and 1930s. “The best buildings constructed on New York’s East Side are from that era,” says James Davidson, partner at SLCE Architects, which designed the project. “If you take a look at The Carlisle and The Pierre, there is an interest in vertical accentuation and drama.” The Delecor, a new 31-story residential tower at 250 East 83rd St., draws inspiration from these historical structures and other art deco jewels in the area, powered by a striking façade featuring 750 precast concrete panels. This setback approach, which yields a slender tower and allows more air and sunlight to reach the streets below, is a common fea-ture among art deco buildings and was critical to The Delecor’s design. Additional setbacks going up also contribute to a more appealing structure. The team required a building material that would not only align with the architectural intent but also stand out visually, given additional high-rises on the same block constructed with similar aesthetics. The answer was precast concrete. According to Thomas Tropea, vice president at BPDL, the team used design assist to bring the project to fruition. “Alongside SLCE, we worked out important elements such as slab edge details, pan-el dimensioning, anchor sizing and location, and window details,” he says. “This involved coordinating with the design team, win-dow manufacturer, owner, and construction manager to ensure that we could meet the project’s aggressive timeline.” Slab edge details were of particular concern to Davidson, who notes that he sought sharp edges in the building’s expression— something precast concrete helped accomplish. Leveraging Québec locations in Alma and Saint-Jean-sur-Riche-lieu, BPDL manufactured 750 precast concrete panels for The Del-ecor’s façade. The panels, which span from column to column and slab to slab, each measured about 20 ft long and 10 ft high. They emulate French limestone in color and character, thanks to a light sandblast. “Selecting precast gave us the shapes that we wanted with a bottom-line cost that allowed us to build what we intended while adding a high level of drama to the façade,” Davidson says. Looking Sharp The development of The Delecor was a collaborative endeavor among the project team, which included owner and developer The Torkian Group, precast concrete producer BPDL, and SLCE Ar-chitects. The design for the building was heavily influenced by its location. “The overall shape is very much generated by the zoning in this part of town,” Davidson says. “It stresses the ability to build tall on a modestly sized footprint, which is the story of most residen-tial high-rises built on NYC’s Upper East Side, especially over the last 20 or 30 years. The building is mandated to have a street wall base, above which you’re allowed to have setbacks.” Advantage: Precast Concrete PROJECT SPOTLIGHT THE DELECOR Location: New York, N.Y. Owner: The Torkian Group, New York, N.Y. Architect: SLCE Architects, New York, N.Y. Envelope Engineer: GMS, New York, N.Y. PCI-Certified Precast Concrete Producer: BPDL, Alma, Québec, Canada Precast Concrete Components: 750 panels, each about 20 ft long by 10 ft high (150,000 ft 2 ) Precast concrete brought a slew of benefits to The Delecor. “One of the biggest advantages of precast was to bring the intent of the architect to life,” Tropea says. “But also, for the construction man-ager, there are fewer people on-site, lessening the chance of inju-ries or accidents. Additionally, because we’re bringing a finished product to the site, there’s no waste to manage—it’s a clean site.” With a compressed schedule, time was of the essence. Davidson says that the SLCE Architects team considered myriad approaches for the design, but ultimately decided on a “donut” shape, which would feature window openings surrounded on all four sides with the precast concrete panels. Besides enabling accelerated construction, the “donut” ap-proach also offered more aesthetic flair to The Delecor. Moving up the building, there are noticeable large, rectangular elements within the façade. In early iterations of the design, only one such rectangle was included for a special amenity floor. But to make that space more purposeful, Davidson added the same motif on the upper and lower parts of the building, resulting in a more ro-bust composition.
Ascent Fall 2025: Page-34
