4 Times Square by Studios Architecture: 2018 Best of Year Winner for Corporate Cafeteria

Frank Gehry’s famed cafeteria for Condé Nast at 4 Times Square was the architect’s first project in the city, featuring the signature rippling curves of his buildings, rendered on a small scale. An invitation to dine there, among the editors of Vogue and the New Yorker, was a coveted opportunity. When the publishing company departed from the building, of course the cafeteria closed as well. In anticipation of a new generation of tenants, Studios Architecture principal David Burns preserved key architectural details while reviving and reprogramming the 45,000-square-foot space with updated amenities.

Burns replaced the laminate flooring with white oak and reupholstered the winding banquettes, once dark brown, in beige. Blue and yellow, for wall paint and café tables, have given way to white. The new palette brings an airiness that complements Gehry’s flowing forms in glass and titanium.

Dining offerings have been refreshed as well. Michelin-starred chef Claus Meyer, co-founder of Copenhagen’s Noma, is offering a choice of six artisanal micro-restaurants instead of standard cafeteria stations. Through a portal at the far end of the main dining area, a lounge offers coffee during the day and transitions into cocktail mode by night. The plant wall that curves behind the crescent-shape bar gives the lounge its name, the Green.

Project Team: Adrielle Slaugh; Kurt Wayne; Jennifer Brown; Nelson Tang; Julia Komarczyk; Luiz Zilberknop.

> See more Best of Year Project Winners from the December 2018 issue of Interior Design