three sisters tower — ryan karczewski

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three sisters tower

Harkening back to the development of layers and the presence of interconnecting horizontal planes, this project began with the study of New York City - specifically Park Avenue. Through further exploration of the city’s vertical layering techniques, we better understood how these techniques can cause social and economic changes between neighborhoods. As Park Avenue journeys north, the change of level of the rail line - from under to above ground - creates a physical barrier between the Upper East Side and East Harlem.

Following this initial research - the class was challenged in creating a multi-use tower just south of the Hudson Yards development. On the border of one of the most expensive housing developments in the nation’s history, and in the center of one of the city's most intense food deserts, my partner and I sought to address a need for more affordable housing as well as access to more affordable food and community resources.

The project, the “Three Sisters Tower”, aims to be a self-sufficient urban farm, market, residential, and research facility. It derives its name from the farming technique developed by the Native Americans of the region, which utilizes the nutrients and low growth height of beans and squash to support the vertical height of the cornstalk. Programmatically, this concept translates to the horizontal ground floor marketplace and horizontal research facility supporting the growth and sale of produce developed within the vertical farms located within each residential module. Each of these programs are centered around two specific cores, both of which are used to funnel, collect, and disperse rainwater.

The tower itself rises vertically through the development and addition of each residential and farming module. Each module contains four floors of apartment spaces that implement constructed shades, allowing for residents to adjust the amount of interaction they want with the outside world. Each module also contains a scientific research station and a “rooftop” glass greenhouse. The module allows water to enter the core itself - as well as the greenhouse - by requiring an open air cavity to be present between itself and the next module and a constructed drainage system to allow rainwater to collect and fall within the walls of the elevator core.