Hit Factory Condos
words by > Jeremy Dillahunt
It’s not really fair to compare New York City’s Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood to its more famous siblings.
Soho’s got sophistication, chic is defined in Chelsea, and the Upper East and West Sides, well, they’ve got countless stories about the Astors, Rockefellers and Hearsts. In fact, until recently, Hell’s Kitchen was mostly infamous.
In comic books, it was the birthplace of Daredevil, and in real life it was home to a number of New York’s legendary street gangs like the Gophers and the Westies, which Leonard Bernstein forever immortalized with the Jets and the Sharks of West Side Story. Hell’s Kitchen has been called Battle Row for its street riots and House of Blazes, after some residents’ propensity to burn down abandoned buildings for fun.
But that’s all in the distant past. Nowadays, the area between 34th and 59th streets and west of 8th Avenue is perhaps best known for battles between local residents and the city planning board. The problem can be summed up rather simply: Manhattan needs more apartments, and Hell’s Kitchen has long been seen as a place ripe for development.
Into this breech has stepped developer Scott Turkington, and, like the neighborhood itself, he’s got a good story to tell. The condos he is selling are located in The Hit Factory, the famous recording studio that once hosted the likes of Stevie Wonder,
Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, John Lennon, The Rolling
Stones and Notorious B.I.G.
“Well, Michael Jackson used to drive his truck into the elevator when he came here to record,” says Michael Chapman, executive vice president of sales for the project. “And Paul Simon likes to come in to the Gibson offices on the first floor and test out guitars every now and again.” Yeah, that’s a pretty good story to pull out when you’re talking about your apartment.
The Hit Factory was once the most successful recording studio of all time. In 1994 alone, the Recording Industry Association of America nominated 41 songs that were recorded in the studio. But as the economic foundation of the music industry began to erode and labels shifted to smaller, digital studios that could produce high-quality sound more cheaply, The Hit
Factory found that it couldn’t compete and closed its doors in early 2005.
Those doors didn’t stay closed for long, however, as Turkington knows a good deal when he sees one. “My partners and I were in the market for a conversion opportunity in New York,” he says. “We wanted something unique in what it was and what it would become. The Hit Factory has a great musical history and would be a unique place to live.” To remind you of that extraordinary past, The Hit Factory lobby will display dozens of gold and platinum albums and, though separate, the Gibson Guitar and Baldwin Piano offices will still occupy the first floor.
Boasting about the history of apartments is nothing new in New York City—“pre war” and “post war” are still symbols of real estate cache in many social circles. However, the granular history used as a selling point at The Hit Factory is something new and fills in the gaps that separate pop culture from historical landmarks.
Walking around the city can at times seem like a stroll through a “who’s who” history of America. Park Avenue features several brownstones built and inhabited by the Rockefellers, Louis Armstrong’s residence in Queens, NY has been turned into a museum, and it’s still possible to sit in the chair Dylan Thomas occupied in the White Horse Tavern shortly before he died. Recently, developers have been capitalizing on that history and cashing in on buyers’ desires to own it.
In New Rochelle, NY, a couple recently purchased a $1.6 million, 5,300-square-foot home in which Norman Rockwell used to paint covers for the Saturday Evening Post, which needed an additional $500,000 in renovations.
In Montauk, NY, the chief executive of a major retail clothing chain purchased 5.6 acres of Andy Warhol’s estate—for $4.8 million an acre. While Chapman concedes that such histories don’t always affect the price of a property, he admits, “A good story isn’t a bad thing; owners sure seem to appreciate them.”
The evidence seems to support Chapman. Though The Hit Factory condos went on the market before they were finished—before they had floors, kitchens, electricity or even walls— most of the 27 units sold in a matter of months. And that’s with an entry-level price of more than $1 million for a one bedroom measuring just over 1,000 square feet. The 3,500-square-foot penthouse with a 1,300-square-foot private terrace and indoor/outdoor fireplace is set to fetch $4.25 million.
As can be expected in New York City’s luxury condo market, The Hit Factory is decked out with exquisite appointments: high ceilings, solid oak floors, Valcucine kitchens, stainless steel cabinets, Miele stoves, Sub Zero refrigerators, Bosch dishwashers, Jacuzzi bathtubs and Philippe Starck bathroom design elements. This is exactly what you’d expect—such touches are standard in the high-end market. But, if faced with a choice and all things are even, what buyer wouldn’t pick the space that once housed Billy Joel fretting over the lyrics to “Keeping the Faith”? As Chapman says, “There is still some of the essence of the artists left here. It is where they figured out some of their best work.”