An 18-story oceanfront condo tower in Miami Beach with only 10 full-floor residences, which started receiving occupants last month, could be seen as a bellwether for this market’s development and sales environment.
The building, called GLASS, was one of the first new residential developments to be completed in the City of Miami Beach in almost five years, and the last high-rise to be built in the desirable South of Fifth neighborhood because of zoning restrictions.
Rene Gonzalez Architect designed GLASS, whose construction was started in December 2013.
Its design is representative of the low-density approach of its developer, Terra Group. “We could have built up to 45 units on this site,” says Terra’s president David Martin, who owns the 14-year-old company with his father Pedro. “But our belief that ‘less is more’ in real estate, coupled with the design of Rene Gonzalez and Raymond Jungles [who did the landscape design], has delivered a stronger finished product.”
The first five floors of GLASS are common areas that include the lobby, pool, and fitness center. The building’s amenities include an onsite estate manager, pool and valet services, housekeeping and maintenance, 24-hour security, and a resident beach club. The building’s elevator, designed by artist Ivan Toth Depeña, contains an interactive installation that mimics the transition from water to sky.
Each of the residence floors offers an all-glass 360-degree view. With compositional use of fritted patterned glass, the building’s exterior blends into the atmosphere by reflecting and capturing the natural landscape.
Living room in a residence at GLASS.
Terra Group confirmed that all 10 units had been presold prior to construction, and those sales were closed in late October and early November. The selling price averaged around $2,700 per square foot, and the units (excluding the penthouse) range from 3,977 sf to 5,400 sf (including outside terraces).
South Florida Business Journal reports that GLASS’s three-story, 7,000-sf penthouse recently sold for $20 million. The founding family of Ohio-based Majestic Steel Properties paid $7.3 million and $7.9 million, respectively, for two units in GLASS, according to the Real Deal, which tracks real estate news in South Florida.
Miami Beach, which during the last recession was awash in unsold condos and townhouses, appears to be back on the saddle again in terms of residential building. The Real Deal reports that with the completion of the GLASS project, developers have constructed 48 new condo buildings with more than 3,715 units east of I-95 in the tri-county South Florida region since 2011. Developers have announced plans to build 11 new condo buildings with nearly 150 units in the South-of-Fifth neighborhood alone.
Related Stories
| Mar 17, 2011
Perkins Eastman launches The Green House prototype design package
Design and architecture firm Perkins Eastman is pleased to join The Green House project and NCB Capital Impact in announcing the launch of The Green House Prototype Design Package. The Prototype will help providers develop small home senior living communities with greater efficiency and cost savings—all to the standards of care developed by The Green House project.
| Mar 11, 2011
Renovation energizes retirement community in Massachusetts
The 12-year-old Edgewood Retirement Community in Andover, Mass., underwent a major 40,000-sf expansion and renovation that added 60 patient care beds in the long-term care unit, a new 17,000-sf, 40-bed cognitive impairment unit, and an 80-seat informal dining bistro.
| Mar 11, 2011
Mixed-income retirement community in Maryland based on holistic care
The Green House Residences at Stadium Place in Waverly, Md., is a five-story, 40,600-sf, mixed-income retirement community based on a holistic continuum of care concept developed by Dr. Bill Thomas. Each of the four residential floors houses a self-contained home for 12 residents that includes 12 bedrooms/baths organized around a common living/social area called the “hearth,” which includes a kitchen, living room with fireplace, and dining area.
| Mar 11, 2011
Texas A&M mixed-use community will focus on green living
HOK, Realty Appreciation, and Texas A&M University are working on the Urban Living Laboratory, a 1.2-million-sf mixed-use project owned by the university. The five-phase, live-work-play project will include offices, retail, multifamily apartments, and two hotels.
| Mar 1, 2011
How to make rentals more attractive as the American dream evolves, adapts
Roger K. Lewis, architect and professor emeritus of architecture at the University of Maryland, writes in the Washington Post about the rising market demand for rental housing and how Building Teams can make these properties a desirable choice for consumer, not just an economically prudent and necessary one.
| Feb 15, 2011
New Orleans' rebuilt public housing architecture gets mixed reviews
The architecture of New Orleans’ new public housing is awash with optimism about how urban-design will improve residents' lives—but the changes are based on the idealism of an earlier era that’s being erased and revised.
| Feb 11, 2011
Chicago high-rise mixes condos with classrooms for Art Institute students
The Legacy at Millennium Park is a 72-story, mixed-use complex that rises high above Chicago’s Michigan Avenue. The glass tower, designed by Solomon Cordwell Buenz, is mostly residential, but also includes 41,000 sf of classroom space for the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and another 7,400 sf of retail space. The building’s 355 one-, two-, three-, and four-bedroom condominiums range from 875 sf to 9,300 sf, and there are seven levels of parking. Sky patios on the 15th, 42nd, and 60th floors give owners outdoor access and views of Lake Michigan.
| Feb 11, 2011
Sustainable community center to serve Angelinos in need
Harbor Interfaith Services, a nonprofit serving the homeless and working poor in the Harbor Area and South Bay communities of Los Angeles, engaged Withee Malcolm Architects to design a new 15,000-sf family resource center. The architects, who are working pro bono for the initial phase, created a family-centered design that consolidates all programs into a single building. The new three-story space will house a resource center, food pantry, nursery and pre-school, and administrative offices, plus indoor and outdoor play spaces and underground parking. The building’s scale and setbacks will help it blend with its residential neighbors, while its low-flow fixtures, low-VOC and recycled materials, and energy-efficient mechanical equipment and appliances will help it earn LEED certification.
| Feb 11, 2011
Apartment complex caters to University of Minnesota students
Twin Cities firm Elness Swenson Graham Architects designed the new Stadium Village Flats, in the University of Minnesota’s East Bank Campus, with students in mind. The $30 million, six-story residential/retail complex will include 120 furnished apartments with fitness rooms and lounges on each floor. More than 5,000 sf of first-floor retail space and two levels of below-ground parking will complete the complex. Opus AE Group Inc., based in Minneapolis, will provide structural engineering services.
| Jan 27, 2011
Perkins Eastman's report on senior housing signals a changing market
Top international design and architecture firm Perkins Eastman is pleased to announce that the Perkins Eastman Research Collaborative recently completed the “Design for Aging Review 10 Insights and Innovations: The State of Senior Housing” study for the American Institute of Architects (AIA). The results of the comprehensive study reflect the changing demands and emerging concepts that are re-shaping today’s senior living industry.
