Dobbs Ferry, New York

Broadway Flats is a new 10-unit residential building with a modern aesthetic in a largely traditional neighborhood near downtown Dobbs Ferry, NY.  

Project Type: Residential – Multi-Family

Project Square Footage: 13,800 sf

Project Budget: $4,000,000

Completion Date: September 2017

Zoning Constraints: Front Yard variance received

Could modern design be built in the historic Village of Dobbs Ferry in 2017?

Our client for the Broadway Flats presented a challenge, which in many places in the world would seem normal. He expected a modern design for his new multi-family building, but in the Village of Dobbs Ferry, known for their preservationist views and resistance to change, obtaining approvals of a modern building by the Planning Board, Zoning Board of Appeals, and Architectural Historical Review Board (AHRB), would be a long shot. The local design guidelines mandated that the building fit the context of the neighborhood in style and character. Although the AHRB approved a few modern homes, there were no modern buildings in or near the downtown, where the site was located. 

The site is narrow and long, 70 x 200 feet, situated between Broadway on the east side, and the Old Croton Aqueduct (OCA), a public trailway, on the west side, and in walking distance to the commercial district. The zoning regulations allowed up to 13 residential units, but our proposal included only 10, to limit the height of the building to three stories, and to restrict the length to allow area for a green space along the OCA. Residents' cars would be hidden in a basement level parking area, that has tiered stone walls and plant beds at the rear of the property to block sight lines from pedestrians using the OCA of vehicular areas. 

The "scale and character" of the community was not easily identified, since there existed a hodgepodge of sizes and styles, including a 59 unit five-story building on the adjacent property to the north with Tudor-style gables and crenelated parapets. We decided that the new building facades visible to the public along Broadway and the OCA would be designed to have similar width and proportions of the neighboring three-story multi-family buildings. Although the 13,800 sf ten-unit building would have large expanses of glass and cement panel cladding, it would fit comfortably with the neighborhood as a result of pedestrian-friendly site development and appropriate massing and scale.  

The building has a mix of one- and two-bedroom apartments, each with a private outdoor space. The main living areas are open kitchen/dining and living areas that have floor-to-ceiling corners of glass to allow panoramic river views. Angled glass bays on the north and south walls provide views of the river from the bedrooms, and provide playful relief to the long side walls of the building. The design for the exterior is treated like a collage, mixing cement panels and lap siding, in grey, linen, and red, with large glass planes, mindful of providing visual breaks and proportions that would be aesthetically pleasing to pedestrians on nearby public thoroughfares. 

Despite public resistance, and a letter in the local paper decrying the error of permitting modern buildings in the Village, we successfully obtained a favorable opinion from all three review boards. Now that the project is built, we hear expressions of delight that modern design can be found in the heart of an old suburban Rivertown.