Inside the Now-Open Amenity Funzone at Mercedes House

Those who frequently refresh the Mercedes House website might have noticed something recently: the renderings of apartments and amenities have been replaced by actual photos. It's a sign of the building's move from "concept," as Asher Abehsera of developer Two Trees puts it, to "programming and activating" all of the ideas for the Enrique Norten-designed building. Photographer Will Femia headed over to Mercedes House last week to get shots of the amenities (and apartments, because why not?), collected in the gallery above.

The amenities?the Mercedes Club, in building parlance?include a gym, yoga studio, basketball court, boxing area, and all kinds of other goodies, and they are free for residents because Two Trees is footing the bill for now. (Abehsera says this is unlikely to be a permanent arrangement, but residents who sign one or two year leases now have their gym fees covered for the lease term.) The club is also open to the public for rates that start around $130/month. Bringing non-residents into the amenities part of the building during the day is partly an attempt to "bring vitality and energy" in while the people who actually live there are at work. Hopefully, the appearance of athletic equipment at last will calm the revolt among some of the first building residents.

The building is currently leasing the second phase of rental apartments, which contains 380 units. About 260 of those have signed leases, Abehsera says, and another 20 have applications out. The pricing on what's left starts at $2,900/month for studios, $3,500/month for 1BRs, $4,400/month for 1BRs with home offices, and $4,800/month for 2BRs.

There's one more phase of rentals to go?construction on the top 10 floors of the building, recently sold to Texas-based investment firm Invesco, should be finished within two weeks. Though those apartments were originally planned as condos, and thus have slightly fancier fixtures, they'll be following the rest of Mercedes House into rental land, with leasing of those 162 units likely to begin sometime in February.
· Official site: Mercedes House [mercedeshouseny.com]
· Mercedes House coverage [Curbed]