Landmarked and now an icon of the New York City skyline, 550 Madison was seen as a quirky and somewhat polarizing piece of architecture upon its completion in 1984. Designed by the seminal Philip Johnson and John Burgee, the 37-story building—with its unique split pediment often likened to a piece of Chippendale furniture—heralded a move away from the familiar flat-topped modernist tower and an ushering in of postmodernism in architecture. Guiding 550 Madison into its next phase of life, global and transdisciplinary design firm Snøhetta repositioned the site with a particular focus on transforming an existing but underutilized Privately-Owned Public Space (POPS) behind the building.

The new vision for the POPS included the installation of a grand glass canopy under which lives a soaring covered outdoor garden, water features, and a diverse selection of seating and social settings. “Responding to the POPS’s spatial condition was an exciting design challenge,” describes Jackie Martinez, MARCH + MLA, and Senior Project Leader at Snøhetta. “We chose to accentuate some of its existing qualities, embracing its height, its narrow width, and its slot-like canyon effect.” Leaning into these existing conditions, a design narrative, which Martinez terms the “urban gorge,” began to emerge. “We wanted to create this nestled feeling, exaggerating the tallness through topography and planting, and bringing the sky down into the narrow space,” she says. “This ‘urban gorge’ idea became one the project’s two main conceptual underpinnings.”

The project’s second conceptual underpinning also responds to an existing spatial condition, but this time looks to alter rather than accentuate it. Before it was a lush and lavish garden, the POPS was an underutilized passthrough area, a drab alleyway with little more than a few under-patronized shops and insufficient seating. “We wanted to make this a place for people to stay,” Martinez describes. “So, our strategy was to create a series of outdoor rooms, breaking up this large slot-like space into smaller spaces, each a different size, each defined by different elements, and each with a different spirit.”

It was at this point in the design process that Martinez brought in Studio 431, Landscape Forms’ custom division, to help design and manufacture the defining furnishings that would bring people into the garden and welcome them to stay. “The stellar reputation of Landscape Forms precedes them. I’ve known about them since my earliest days in the profession, but until this project, I never had the opportunity to work with Studio 431,” she says. “They came highly recommended by our colleagues for their collaborative approach, which really appealed to the way we work at Snøhetta.”

Born out of this new collaborative relationship was a comprehensive collection of custom wood site furnishings—benches, round tables, and bar tables—that speak to the project’s design philosophy and cultural context. “We wanted the furniture to feel big and robust to complement the massive vertical scale of the garden. This is New York, this is Midtown, so it needed to have this grandness, this sturdiness, and this feeling of permanence,” Martinez describes. “But we also wanted it to feel soft and warm. There’s a lot of stone and a certain hardness to the design of Midtown, so bringing in the right wood elements was essential in making the garden the oasis we wanted it to be.”

And an oasis it became. Beneath the sky views of the glass canopy, a series of circular open-air rooms welcome interactions of all kinds, their shape informed by the building’s hallmark “Chippendale” crown. Within each room, custom Studio 431 elements make place for people—radiused benches line sculptural precast walls, sweeping bar tables create lively social space, toroidal tables sprout with plantings from their centers, and a cozy nook bench surrounds a warming steam feature. Each seating position reveals an inspiring new view as tiered native and regional plantings mingle with sights of the neighboring façades and mansard roofs on Madison Avenue. 

Continuing to visit the garden after the project’s completion, Martinez describes a setting that’s full of life, used to its fullest potential, and already a much-appreciated amenity for New Yorkers. "It’s one thing to have a design goal of creating a variety of experiences. But when you see people actually experiencing the space, realizing it was designed and built for them to enjoy in their own way, it’s really gratifying,” she says.