Monadnock Development announced the completion and occupancy of 300 Huntington, a six-story, 136,000-square-foot mixed-use commercial development in Gowanus/Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, and the neighborhoods’ only new ground-up office/commercial building.
The building was designed by a partnership of Dattner Architects and Bernheimer Architecture. Concurrently, the Brooklyn-based developer has announced the completion of 300 Huntington’s public-facing 8,700-plus-square foot waterfront esplanade, a primary gateway to the Gowanus public waterfront park, designed by Scape Landscape Architecture.
“Monadnock is pleased to usher in a new year by completing this innovative development and welcoming our tenants and the public to 300 Huntington,” said Nick Lembo, chairman of Monadnock Development. “Offering our community brand-new, column-free workspaces, beautifully curated outdoor spaces and creative retail opportunities is a testament to the work we’ve long undertaken as part of the Gowanus community.”
Monadnock Construction has moved into its permanent headquarters on the second and third floors of the building. The firm, which has built more than 25,000 units of affordable and market-rate housing in New York City since its inception 45 years ago, was formerly located at 155 Third Street on the Gowanus waterfront and the site of a forthcoming 22-story residential building by Monadnock Development.
Additionally, Hazel Village —an ethical handmade toy manufacturer that partners with artisans in Peru, Nepal, Cambodia, Colombia and locally in Brooklyn — has signed a lease for its new expanded workshop and showroom.
“Hazel Village’s expansion to a new space at 300 Huntington marks a new era for our company,” said Jane Van Cleef, CEO of Hazel Village. “The building offers our Brooklyn-based team much-needed room for growth — to our physical space, to our workforce and to our operations overall — and we eagerly look forward to serving the local community and our customers around the globe by meeting increased demand from our new home.”
300 Huntington boasts 49,000 square feet of column-free office and creative space, along with 17,000 square feet of optimally located ground-floor retail space. In addition to two 4,000-pound passenger/freight elevators fit for light industrial tenants, the fully electric building offers energy recovery ventilation, and a green roof. The building offers tenants access to 7,000 square feet of shared private amenity terrace space, along with the recently completed esplanade and public park, designed by Scape Landscape Architecture as a key point of entry to the Gowanus public waterfront space. The esplanade will deliver several amenities to the public such as waterfront spaces for community gatherings and performances, environmental education, ecosystem restoration and community nurseries.
As the first phase to be completed as part of the overall plan, the esplanade is shaded by oak trees as well as metal latticework and vine trellises that evoke Gowanus’ industrial history. Flexible seating options along the building’s frontage provide moments of pause, reflection, and relaxation. To help mitigate the effects of stormwater runoff and overflow, the esplanade steps down to a seated overlook and terraced stormwater planters along the canal. Additionally, varying bulkhead heights carve out additional space for a near-contiguous planter with native, water-tolerant plant species to soften the edge condition. Throughout the outdoor terrace, wooden ballast blocks and a textured concrete seat wall provide additional seating options, bordered on one end by a sculpture meadow planted with native grasses.
