[Renderings courtesy dbox]
Who knew that they used to make Tootsie Rolls down in Soho? The now-empty building at 325 West Broadway where the tasty treats were produced is about to become a bunch of sweet new condos. Appropriately, the 29-unit development will carry the moniker The Chocolate Factory and will rise just north of the nearly-complete and ever-pricier Soho Mews—and span the lot all the way over to Wooster Street, a lot that will be bisected by a private garden. All this comes from Beyhan Karahan & Associates Architects, whose website offers up this spectacular reveal.
Backstory, per the architects: the site consists of "Four existing buildings, some from the late 19th century, and some as early as the federal period were combined at the site to be used as a chocolate factory."
The two older buildings at 23-25 Wooster Street will remain and be restored, but the nearly featureless factory building that went up in the 1960s and fronts onto West Broadway will come down and be replaced by a nine-story building with an asymmetrical facade of masonry and glass. The block-through complex, to be bisected by that private garden, is governed by a veritable encyclopedia of restrictive declarations from the Landmarks Preservation Commission, covering everything from setbacks to windows. The development is being put together by a gang called ADG-SoHo LLC, who bought the property in 2006 from Tootsie Roll Industries for a sweet $23 million.
Considering there will only be 29 units in the Chocolate Factory when finished, our calculations tell us that the money we've put aside for penny-candies won't quite get it done. Still, yummy.
· Projects > Residential > Chocolate Factory [Beyhan Karahan & Associates Architects website]
· Deed: 325 Broadway [NYC Department of Finance]
· Restrictive Declaration: 325-329 W. Broadway [NYC LPC]
