Oxford Office Bldg. | 125 Lincoln St | Leather District

[dshoost88]

Screengrabs:

I think given the truths of 2020 and the inherent options/needs that can be addressed by real estate developers, this is a completely practical, justified, and satisfactory project. Before this project gets any more diatribes from the tall building fetishists among us, lets look at the facts:
- This project change wasn't about height--it was about use. The profile of the building has changed from office space to R&D space (see screengrab below).
- Demand for Class A Office Space will, unfortunately, continue to decline. By some of my early estimates, at least as many as a quarter to a third of white collar employees may transition to teleworking permanently.
- Thanks largely to Metro Boston's emergence as a global life sciences hub, an unprecedented amount of capital continues to flood into research and development for our Bio-Pharma, Life Sciences, and specialized manufacturing employers. There is momentum for them to grow, and the space they demand is more specialized (i.e. more costly per square foot) than a traditional office building.
- Despite our bevy of life sciences employers that are growing, there is a dearth of real estate opportunities for them to grow at the moment. Developments like this one (and the dozens of other R&D spaces queued up in the development timeline around the region) will close that gap. It's the most economical path forward.

Boston's strength is at the street level, and this is especially important near our transit hubs. This development as presented is an improvement. It's a handsome building. It's a timely use, and one that will probably command high rent given its proximity to so much transit (I don't know that there's a comparably-sized R&D building in Boston's Downtown, Leather District, or otherwise... not until you cross the Fort Point Channel). This is good.

 

[TallIsGood]

Once folks start, well... dictating... that a tower should be X height, in total alienation from market realities, well, that sounds like Pyongyang to me. No thanks.

Is that what we do now? But almost always shrinking it?

 

[DBM]

Is that what we do now? But almost always shrinking it?

Yes. To say something is "necessary" is to issue a dictate. No need to belabor that further. But who is the "we" here, precisely? And what is the "it" here, precisely? These are vague abstractions that need clarification.

 

[stefal]

OK, it's a huge upgrade over what is there right now. Build it. Happy?

I wasn't directly upset with your comment. I'm more upset that the recent trend is that the stuff being proposed is "just good enough" or "better than a parking lot/empty lot/empty building." We can only have so many poor quality background buildings before it starts to turn south, and on these prime lots, we should be seeing legitimately good design. The remaining downtown/core projects are only going to get more complicated and expensive to redevelop, and the "capital A" Architecture budget will be the first to get slashed. These easy parcels in prime locations getting easy architecture is depressing.

We get a top-notch firm like S9 to come in after they dropped Gensler's B-team design, and they still make a B-team grade design. That's happened a few times in Boston/Cambridge recently where top-tier international architecture firms put out filler/non-portfolio projects in Boston. Why spend the extra money on them if you're not getting exceptional design?

The design itself isn't terrible, it's good enough. The facade seems lazily assembled and the massing seems to be dictated by the program/site, but Architecture is about dealing with these problems elegantly. Perhaps it will grow on me, perhaps I'll get a bitter taste in my mouth walking by it, we'll know when it's done.

 

[Bananarama]

Seems like a relatively pleasant design. Inoffensive, yes, but also a nice attempt to be contextual with that lower podium-esque area. I just hope those redish panels aren't crappy alucobond and instead of stone (wishful thinking...)

The normal-offset-normal grid effect of the mullions as they wrap the facade is sort of subtle. I wish it was reinforced with a color/material gradient as well, or something more bold.

 

[HenryAlan]

I kind of like it. Although I enjoy a good tower here and there, I'm much more interested in street level interaction and contextual fit. This building scores pretty well on both of those metrics. I especially like the faux leather district facade on Beach St., and the way it sort of melts away as you transition to the Greenway facing side of the building. The re-designed massing means a solid practical purpose that will advance Boston's leadership in lab science. We should be so lucky to have a few dozen more like this scattered about the area.

 

[stick n move]

The street level is really appropriate and though short the tower seems to be pretty high quality too. The rounded corners are a nice touch.

 

[Blackbird]

--the rapid deterioration of the office market with the devastation wrought by the pandemic
--the 2.4 million plus sf of office coming online over the next few years in Downtown with South Station Tower, Winthrop Ctr Tower, and Bulfinch Tower rising (granted, .5 million of that 2.4 million will be absorbed by State Street Corp moving to Bulfinch Tower--but in the larger market, that's just musical chairs).

Why do you think they're building anything in the first place if the situation is so dire?

Edit: Nevermind! dshoot's clarification about the building becoming R&D was enough.
Don't know why you went off about office space if that's not what this building will be used for..

 

[DZH22]

Don't know why you went off about office space if that's not what this building will be used for..

It was originally proposed as office.

 

[Blackbird]

It was originally proposed as office.

Yeah I guess its more of a question like: "lab buildings are A-OK practically everywhere within the city and neighboring cities, while office towers can only ever be built in this one, small area. So shouldn't we set aside this parcel for when someone wants to build a tower and encourage lab growth literally everywhere else?"

Eh. I don't know; I think its a good thought, but how long will it be until we need another massive office tower. Could the developer have made this into a residential highrise?

 

[Plen-T-Pak]

Yeah I guess its more of a question like: "lab buildings are A-OK practically everywhere within the city and neighboring cities, while office towers can only ever be built in this one, small area. So shouldn't we set aside this parcel for when someone wants to build a tower and encourage lab growth literally everywhere else?"

Eh. I don't know; I think its a good thought, but how long will it be until we need another massive office tower. Could the developer have made this into a residential highrise?

Ever since Teradyne left the leather district years ago there hasn't been much left aside from condos and corporate offices. Lab space seems like an interesting addition to the mix in this area.

 

[Jahvon09]

Interesting site, I wonder what the history is ?what did this replace ,was it built as part of the Central Artery from land taken when that was built? glad to see it go, never liked this building even after they renovated it a few years back

Not to get off-topic, but the front of the building on the left looks like the shape of this Bose radio. Hah!!

 

[shawn]

While I certainly appreciate the "appropriate" sentiment, the "necessary" aspect is downright bizarre--"necessary" to appease your and like-minded urbanists' philosophical/ideological principles? Or "necessary" in response to market signals?
...
Once folks start, well... dictating... that a tower should be X height, in total alienation from market realities, well, that sounds like Pyongyang to me. No thanks.

I did qualify my post with "practically", and went out of my way to mention I don't care about height for height's sake. I also admittedly missed that this is now lab space and no longer an office. I understand the physical constraints labs face, as we've covered this countless times over the past nearly-20 years of this forum's life.

My comment was meant to be understood similarly to stefal's: I don't feel "good enough" or "better than nothing during these trying times" or "at least it's no longer a parking lot" is an acceptable standard for a city of Boston's standing. Or for the city Boston aspires towards; we're not Nashville. Height here is subjectively "necessary" to provide a visually-pleasing sense of balance in a quite visually-prominent location. That's it. Nothing ideological. Unless you feel aesthetic sense is ideology?

 

[JeffDowntown]

I think given the truths of 2020 and the inherent options/needs that can be addressed by real estate developers, this is a completely practical, justified, and satisfactory project. Before this project gets any more diatribes from the tall building fetishists among us, lets look at the facts:
- This project change wasn't about height--it was about use. The profile of the building has changed from office space to R&D space (see screengrab below).
- Demand for Class A Office Space will, unfortunately, continue to decline. By some of my early estimates, at least as many as a quarter to a third of white collar employees may transition to teleworking permanently.
- Thanks largely to Metro Boston's emergence as a global life sciences hub, an unprecedented amount of capital continues to flood into research and development for our Bio-Pharma, Life Sciences, and specialized manufacturing employers. There is momentum for them to grow, and the space they demand is more specialized (i.e. more costly per square foot) than a traditional office building.
- Despite our bevy of life sciences employers that are growing, there is a dearth of real estate opportunities for them to grow at the moment. Developments like this one (and the dozens of other R&D spaces queued up in the development timeline around the region) will close that gap. It's the most economical path forward.

Boston's strength is at the street level, and this is especially important near our transit hubs. This development as presented is an improvement. It's a handsome building. It's a timely use, and one that will probably command high rent given its proximity to so much transit (I don't know that there's a comparably-sized R&D building in Boston's Downtown, Leather District, or otherwise... not until you cross the Fort Point Channel). This is good.

View attachment 8913

So the R&D programming is an interesting twist. I wonder what market analysis suggests a demand for R&D space, isolated, in the Leather District.

R&D space is almost always part of a cluster -- it just tends to rock that way. Maybe this is close enough to Tufts Medical to align with that space, but there is no commercial R&D cluster there today.

 

[DBM]

My comment was meant to be understood similarly to stefal's: I don't feel "good enough" or "better than nothing during these trying times" or "at least it's no longer a parking lot" is an acceptable standard for a city of Boston's standing. Or for the city Boston aspires towards; we're not Nashville. Height here is subjectively "necessary" to provide a visually-pleasing sense of balance in a quite visually-prominent location. That's it. Nothing ideological. Unless you feel aesthetic sense is ideology?

All good, thoughtful clarifications here... but, yes, I take it as a given that aesthetic sense is inherently ideological!

It communicates a set of value judgments that are personal to the artist (or critic), and the personal is political. To illustrate it via the most notorious architectural fantasy in history: Hitler's aesthetic sensibility reflected (or betrayed) his grotesque megalomania and reactionary neo-classicism. He thought it was important to communicate that. Thus, he commissioned Albert Speer to scheme up Germania.

(And, quite right, we're not Nashville, we should aspire to more. But to say "the city Boston aspires towards"--well, who, exactly, is doing that aspiring? The BPDA? Developers? NIMBY activists? The archboston forum?)

 

[TallIsGood]

Yes. To say something is "necessary" is to issue a dictate. No need to belabor that further. But who is the "we" here, precisely? And what is the "it" here, precisely? These are vague abstractions that need clarification.

The “we” could be community groups to the city such as the height of the TD Garden towers where they were reduced below allowable zoning because neighbors. The “it” is dictating height as you suggested. My point was I don’t know why dictating heights on the high end or low end are any different. If they are not in response to market forces then they are just fiat.

 

[DZH22]

They could build 100 of these right across the Fort Point Channel. Why stick a Seaport sized building in a place that doesn't actually force you to cap the height that low? Aesthetically, mixing Seaport blocks into the main skyline is not a good look. Even if you think the building by itself looks nice enough, the placement and proportions drag down the overall aesthetic of the city as a whole.

Considering we have a housing crunch in this city and this is right across from South Station, if anything it should be a 600' residential. Frankly, as soon as Covid passes we'd have enough demand in Boston to fill 20 new 600' residentials.

 

[George_Apley]

This thread is raising a lot of good questions about urban planning in general. When (if ever) is it appropriate for planners to nix a project because it doesn't match the long-term vision for the parcel? I'm not sure what (if any) variances this project needs from the city. If it does need variances, then we ask ourselves if the ZBA variance protocols should be used as rubber stamps, or if they should be used as master planning tools (as it is, the ZBA seems to be a quasi-corrupt gatekeeper more than anything else).

As stated, this is one parcel that could host a tower of significant height. But that's not the deal on the table. The owners have their own deal that they can get built now and the libertarian argument would be that it's practically theft for the government to deny them the opportunity to build within existing law. The whole libertarian/neolib push to relax/eliminate zoning rules would certainly preclude most types of directed urban planning on any land that's not directly owned by the govt.

 

[shmessy]

They could build 100 of these right across the Fort Point Channel. Why stick a Seaport sized building in a place that doesn't actually force you to cap the height that low? Aesthetically, mixing Seaport blocks into the main skyline is not a good look. Even if you think the building by itself looks nice enough, the placement and proportions drag down the overall aesthetic of the city as a whole.

Considering we have a housing crunch in this city and this is right across from South Station, if anything it should be a 600' residential. Frankly, as soon as Covid passes we'd have enough demand in Boston to fill 20 new 600' residentials.

I agree. Context is fundamental. This is just jarring and out of balance here. As my wife would say "Bad feng shui".

 

[HarvardP]

They could build 100 of these right across the Fort Point Channel. Why stick a Seaport sized building in a place that doesn't actually force you to cap the height that low? Aesthetically, mixing Seaport blocks into the main skyline is not a good look. Even if you think the building by itself looks nice enough, the placement and proportions drag down the overall aesthetic of the city as a whole.

Considering we have a housing crunch in this city and this is right across from South Station, if anything it should be a 600' residential. Frankly, as soon as Covid passes we'd have enough demand in Boston to fill 20 new 600' residentials.

If you still think the city will need 20 60-floor res buildings, at market rate, after vaccinations become more prevalent (end of summer '21 earliest), you have officially checked out. Now if MassHousing announces a few thousand new (not earmarked for displaced current renters) units, those will fill up in a flash.

Pre-Covid height and density fetishes always made me scratch my head, but to keep the fantasy alive in the face of enormous changes in occupancy and location value, that's clinical delusion.