In 2007, TEN Arquitectos won a competition to develop a new master plan for Rutgers University's College Avenue Campus. In 2009, as part of the first phase of the project, construction began on a new graduate and professional development campus in Livingston. The Rutgers Business School, a 14,000-square-meter building, was designed and built, and inaugurated in 2014. The L-shaped building acts as the entrance to the campus. Its interiors are connected vertically by a 60 feet tall atrium that features a skylight and horizontally through various common areas that include a library, a cafeteria, and a student lounge. The building has a LEED Silver certificate for its operational and energy efficiency.

Rutgers University Business School

The Americano Hotel is a boutique hotel located in the Chelsea neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, designed by Mexican architect Enrique Norten of TEN Arquitectos and opened in 2011. The hotel has 56 rooms and suites, as well as a restaurant, bar, and rooftop pool. The Americano Hotel is known for its distinctive design, which features a stainless steel mesh facade. The mesh creates a shimmering effect that changes throughout the day, and it also provides privacy for guests while allowing natural light to filter in. The hotel's interior is a mix of modern and vintage furnishings.

Americano Hotel

Mercedes House is a 32-story residential skyscraper located at 550 West 54th Street in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. It was designed by Mexican architect Enrique Norten of TEN Arquitectos and developed by Two Trees Management. The building was completed in 2012 and has 864 apartments. Mercedes House is known for its distinctive design, which features a zigzagging glass facade. The facade creates a dynamic and ever-changing appearance that reflects the surrounding cityscape. The building's interior is equally stylish, with a mix of modern and contemporary furnishings. Mercedes House is a luxury rental building that offers residents a variety of amenities, including a 24-hour doorman, a fitness center, a rooftop terrace, and a children's playroom. The building also has a number of on-site parking options.

Mercedes House

Enrique Norten discusses the challenge in designing the Mercedes House in that the footprint was nearly an entire Manhattan city block. Due to its location being close to the Hudson River, and the fact that the majority of the building is residential, the architects took advantage of the views of the river and of the city skyline. 

The HABITA Hotel is located at the corner of Av. Presidente Mazaryk and Lamartine Street in Colonia Polanco, one of the busiest commercial corridors in Mexico City. The hotel was built in the 1950s as an apartment building, but was renovated in 2004 to become a hotel. The renovation included the addition of a translucent glass skin that covers the entire building. The glass skin is perforated with horizontal stripes of transparent glass, which direct and frame the views from the hotel rooms. The translucent façade continually changes color, brightness, and reflections based on the light conditions, clouds, time of day, and sky hues. During the night the building becomes an urban lantern whose intensity varies according to the use inside.The ground floor of the hotel houses the reception and restaurant. The reception is separated from the street by a thin transparent glass skin. The access through Mazaryk Avenue is framed by means of a suspended horizontal plane that cuts out the building from south to north. This virtual circulation is contained by a solid stone bar, a mural, and a light box that functions as a counter.The HABITA Hotel proposes a space of tranquility and rest in the heart of one of the most energetic neighborhoods in the city. The immaterial and ethereal image of the building stimulates an intense sensory experience for the visitor. The main architectural element of the hotel is light, which, when interacting with the different surfaces, reinforces the qualities of the materials, making the spaces come alive through their very habitability.

Hotel Habita

Enrique Norten, Hon. FAIA was born in Mexico City where he graduated from the Universidad Iberoamericana with a degree in architecture in 1978. He obtained a Master of Architecture from Cornell University in 1980. In 1986 he founded TEN Arquitectos [Taller de Enrique Norten Arquitectos] in Mexico City, and in 2001 opened a second office in New York initiating a lifelong commitment to Architecture and Design. 

“I should very proudly say, if you will permit me, that now I’m a man of two cities. Mexico City’s my city by birth, wheremy heart was formed, and New York is my city of choice. I could have selected any city in the world, but I’m very proudto have selected New York. The energy, the intellectual quality of the city, is very, very high; you cannot find it elsewhere.It’s like this: I have the enormous privilege of sitting with one of the great thinkers of the world, having a conversation infront of all of you, because I’m in New York. Because we both happen to be in New York. That’s what New York is for us.” - Enrique Norten

AIA New York | Center for Architecture

Cocktails & Conversations: Enrique Norten and Pedro Gadanho 

Pedro Gadanho is an architect, curator, and writer currently based in New York. He is the Curator for Contemporary Architecture at the Department of Architecture and Design at MoMA. He was the editor-in-chief of Beyond, Short Stories on the Post-Contemporary-a bookazine started in 2009 through Sun Architecture. He is the author of Arquitectura em Publico (Dafne, 2011).  

Eben Klemm, a former research biologist, is especially interested in encouraging knowledge among bartenders concerning the basic chemical and physics principals that affect the materials they use in order to better understand the techniques they use. Klemm and his cocktails have been featured in such diverse local and national publications as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Food and Wine, Time Out New York, Popular Science, and Playboy. He has also made televised appearances include The Today Show, CBS's Early Show and ABC 20/20. His cocktail book for beginners, The Cocktail Primer, was published in December by Andrews McNeel.

I sprang this one on the architect. By sheer kismet, I met Enrique years earlier at a dinner party in a restaurant on the Lower East Side. We had an extensive conversation about tequila, but the only part that I remember was his favorite brand.

Enrique Norten

SITES

ADDITIONAL PHOTOGRAPHS

DRAWINGS