Luxury-living in Philadelphia has reached new heights with the completion of The Laurel and 1909 Rittenhouse Apartments. Located on what was the last undeveloped section of Rittenhouse Square, the 50-story tower soars to a height of 604 feet making it the tallest residential building in Philadelphia. The L-shaped property includes an assortment of condominiums, apartments, luxury amenities, retail, offices, and a 120-space underground parking garage.

This community features 185 apartment units in the lower floors (1909 Rittenhouse) and 64 condominiums on the upper floors (The Laurel) with separate lobbies and entrances via a stone-clad entry pavilion. The floor plan features expansive corner residences, offering panoramic views of the city. Residents can enjoy valet parking, an indoor lap pool and hot tub, a five-star fitness center with a luxury locker room, steam room and sauna, yoga and Peloton room, club room and terrace overlooking Rittenhouse Square with bar and catering kitchen, conference room, and dog spa.The tower also includes 44,000 SF of high-end restaurant and retail space on the first three floors wrapping around Walnut, Sansom, and 20th Streets.

The development consists of two structures, a low-rise amenity building, and a high-rise tower which are separated by Moravian Street. Construction of The Laurel began with several utility relocations to allow for a tunnel to be constructed under Moravian Street. The tunnel connects the low-rise amenity building to the tower. In addition to the tunnel, a bridge was constructed over Moravian Street allowing for connection of the 2nd, 3rd and amenity levels of the two buildings. To service The Laurel and the adjacent properties, new water, storm, and sanitary services were installed in addition to communications, electric, and natural gas. Once the two structures were complete, Moravian Street was reconstructed to establish a new streetscape between the buildings with new pavers, curbs, sidewalks, lighting, landscaping, and asphalt paving.

Hunter Roberts provided pre-construction and construction management services for The Durst Organization’s latest project: a 66-story, 730-foot mixed-use building in Long Island City, New York. This development features a 940-unit residential tower, including 300 affordable housing units, and offers amenities such as an outdoor pool and first-level retail spaces. Additionally, the project encompasses a half-acre public park, advanced technology infrastructure including a large Main Distribution Frame (MDF) room, a building-wide Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) system, and a cogeneration power system. Enhancements were also made to the Queens Plaza subway station entrance. A key architectural highlight is the curtain wall on the south façade, equipped with an electronically activated film in the windows that enables the glass to change tint.

Sven is the only LEED v4 BD+C: New Construction Multifamily Platinum certified structure in existence. In addition, Sven is the largest LEED v4 BD+C: New Construction Platinum certified project in the world.

The project includes the adaptive reuse of the Landmarked Bank of Manhattan building with the historic Clock Tower. The project team provided protection and restoration of the Landmarked building while coordinating logistics with the residential tower.

The logistics were extremely complicated as the site is bordered by the elevated and underground subway trains on the east side and the north side by the East Side Access project, which was under construction by the MTA and will extend the Long Island Rail Road from its main line in Queens to a new terminal under Grand Central Station in Manhattan.