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\n Is 80 Clarkson the second coming of \u2018Limestone Jesus,\u2019 the Zeckendorfs\u2019 mid-aughts sales miracle 15 Central Park West? Or just another downtown luxury condo?
\n Photo-Illustration: Curbed; Photo: DBOX\n <\/p>\n
The first closings at 80 Clarkson aren\u2019t expected to happen until the end of the year, but its limestone-clad frame, rising along the West Side Highway across from Pier 40, already dominates the string of high-end condos that line the downtown waterfront. Its two towers topped out at 45 and 37 stories last summer, more than twice the height of most of its neighbors, and it now looms over 160 Leroy<\/a> to its north, making the bow-fronted, 15-story Herzog & de Meuron building next door look like a shiny little bonbon. Height isn\u2019t the only thing it\u2019s lording over the competition: 80 Clarkson\u2019s developers, Zeckendorf Development and Atlas Capital Group with the Baupost Group, have been doing everything they can to make their development the spiritual and financial successor to 15 Central Park West, a.k.a. \u201cLimestone Jesus,\u201d the Zeckendorf family\u2019s runaway hit of the early aughts that set off the craze for ultra-high-end supertall condos. The Lincoln Square condo, which combined a prewar aesthetic and prime location on the park with all the advantages of a new-construction condo, turned the clubby, co-op-centric world of New York real estate into a speculative game for global billionaires. Apartments at 15 CPW, considered absurdly priced when sales started, proved so in demand that they routinely fetched double or triple the amount on resale.<\/p>\n At 80 Clarkson, the Zeckendorfs are once again building a pair of limestone towers in a last-of-its-kind location \u2014 what the developers describe in marketing materials as \u201cthe largest remaining Hudson River waterfront property\u201d in the West Village \u2014 with locked-in views and unrivaled development rights transferred from Pier 40<\/a>, a trade-off that involved attaching 175 units of senior housing to the development\u2019s less glamorous east side. Just as at 15 CPW, the floor plans are grand, the amenities lavish, and the finishes and overall vibe, in the words of Compass broker Leonard Steinberg, \u201cmainstream global luxe: very beautiful, very high-end, not offensive in any way.\u201d That is, the soul of quiet luxury (also, a little boring). They even hired the architects and designers behind the past few \u201cIt\u201d buildings \u2014 Cookfox, which designed 150 Charles, and Thierry Despont, who did the interiors at 220 Central Park South (where Ken Griffin bought a record-setting $238 million condo). The marketing, in the manner of 220 CPS, is nonexistent: The developers have released no interior renderings, no public listings, and no sales figures. The building has a projected sellout of over $2 billion \u2014 a huge sum, particularly for downtown, making the stakes on this project notably high\u00a0\u2014 but how much has actually been sold is a matter of hearsay and speculation. A broker familiar with sales there tells me that it\u2019s at least 60 percent, but Donna Olshan, who tracks the Manhattan luxury market and publishes a weekly report on contracts signed over $4 million, refuses to include deals at 80 Clarkson because the sales team won\u2019t confirm them. \u201cIf they won\u2019t give you the details, it\u2019s hard to know the truth,\u201d she says. The extreme secrecy has made some brokers suspicious: Is 80 Clarkson really the Second Coming of Limestone Jesus? Or is it just really good at faking it?<\/p>\n \n The motor court of 80 Clarkson. There will also be a waiting room for drivers. One of the things we do know about 80 Clarkson: the prices. They are, everyone agrees, somewhere between really high and exorbitant, around $6,500 per square foot. Since the developers filed the offering plan with the attorney general last February, they have submitted amendments to raise prices five times. \u201cClad any building in limestone and they\u2019ll come running!\u201d says Steinberg. The apartments range from two-to-seven-bedrooms, most with unique layouts: duplexes, penthouses, full- and half-floors. Prices start at just under $8 million. Half the apartments have private-elevator access, and three-quarters have private outdoor spaces. Still, purchasing a unit in the building won\u2019t get you access to some of its most-prized features. The building has 112 apartments but just 18 accessory apartments for staff, which are available only for full-floor units, which start at $25.5 million and $41.25 million, depending on the tower. \u201cMy client really wants one, but they won\u2019t let them buy it,\u201d Danielle Nazinitsky, the founder of Decode Real Estate, tells me;\u00a0their purchase of a $12.8 million three-bedroom doesn\u2019t cut it. The parking spaces and wine cellars are also meted out sparingly, according to brokers, with preference going to the buyers of the larger units.<\/p>\n In December, The Real Deal reported <\/a>that a buyer had gone into contract on a $129 million high-floor combo, a deal that would wipe out the previous downtown record. It\u2019s more than $40 million over the next-highest sale, a penthouse at 140 Jane Street, which went into contract<\/a> in August asking $88 million. The buyer of the Clarkson condo was said to be represented by Michael Balanevsky, a broker at Accent Holdings who, \u201caccording to his website,\u201d was described as having \u201cestablished a strong Russian clientele,\u201d sparking rumors that the buyer might be an oligarch, unlikely though that would seem at the moment. The website belongs to a development firm where Balanevsky appears not to have worked for at least a decade, back when Russian oligarchs were still buying up Manhattan trophy apartments.<\/p>\n \n Three-quarters of units in the building have private outdoor spaces. Nazinitsky tells me she was surprised by how many units had already been sold when she took a client to the sales gallery this past fall. \u201cI don\u2019t think they have any two-beds left. Basically, all the three-beds with views were gone, and there were still some $20 million four-beds and $30 million full-floors,\u201d she says. That client decided not to buy there because all the three-beds with open kitchens had been spoken for. But after Nazinitsky saw how fast the development was selling, she alerted another client, who managed to nab the last three-bedroom with a view, albeit one with a closed kitchen, to be used as a pied-\u00e0-terre.<\/p>\n So who\u2019s buying at 80 Clarkson? Clayton Orrigo, an agent at Compass who has sold a number of units in the building, tells me that the buyers are \u201ccoming from all the best buildings in the city: 150 Charles, the Shephard, the Greenwich Lane, 15 Central Park West, 220 Central Park South.\u201d He won\u2019t say how many units he has sold, although it\u2019s been reported that the team he leads, the Hudson Advisory Team, has done over $100 million in sales there. Another high-end broker who does a lot of downtown deals describes the buyers as \u201cNew Yorkers who have been around a while and understand the nuances of New York.\u201d It\u2019s people who already own in downtown trophy buildings, like Superior Ink and 150 Charles, that were all the rage when they went up ten or 15 years ago. Another says he hasn\u2019t heard of any big names yet, \u201cbut there are a lot of families \u2014 Greenwich, Rye, Westchester people. I would expect 80 percent of the buyers have two or three homes.\u201d There is no dominant industry or age group, brokers say, \u201cbut whoever it is is at the top of their game.\u201d And the building is said to be younger than uptown condos like 15 CPW, 220 CPS, and 432 Park, where there are virtually no families with young children.<\/p>\n It can be a little hard to suss out how much brokers know and are being discreet versus how much they don\u2019t know and are not willing to admit. So much of what happens at 80 Clarkson is shrouded in mystery, and that\u2019s by design. When I ask one broker if she knows of any high-profile buyers in the building, she asks if we could go off the record. I agree. \u201cYes, there are high-profile buyers,\u201d she says. I wait for more, but that is all she will say. Appointments with the sales team, brokers Dan Tubb and Amy Williamson, are tightly guarded, and I am told that \u201cat the beginning, they were so inundated that you couldn\u2019t get an appointment unless you knew Dan\u2019s or Amy\u2019s cell phone.\u201d The sales site is just a \u201cContact us\u201d form, though one broker describes 80 Clarkson\u2019s sales strategy as open compared with 220\u2019s famously opaque process. For those who gain entry to the sales gallery, 80 Clarkson puts on an impressive, full-fledged show with full-size renderings, an Imax-like presentation screen, and a walk-through of a model kitchen, bathroom, and even an indoor terrace with realistic lighting and patio flooring. Whereas \u201c220 had watercolors.\u201d And while Steven Roth is said to have curated 220\u2019s buyers like an old-school co-op, the Zeckendorfs aren\u2019t vetting buyers based on social desirability, even if they\u2019re playing hard to get.<\/p>\n \n The building, with air rights from Pier 40, looms over its luxury neighbors on the West Side Highway. There are some indications that sales may have slowed, at least slightly, now that most of what\u2019s left are the bigger apartments. A broker tells me that Tubb, one of the sales directors, reached out to him in the fall. \u201cHe was behaving in a way that I wouldn\u2019t say was desperate, but he was more accommodating.\u201d \u201cLike what?\u201d I ask. \u201cGetting into the building and seeing actual units.\u201d Orrigo tells me that he too was a little doubtful about the project\u2019s prospects at first: \u201cI was like, Are they going to kill it? They have a lot of units to sell.\u201d But after selling numerous units in the building, he calls it \u201ca massive success.\u201d He says buyers love open-water views and the proximity to Teterboro.<\/p>\n Still, several people I spoke with pointed out that the location is a little meh: it may technically be West Village, but it\u2019s not cute West Village, and it\u2019s on the border of Hudson Square, next to the new Google Headquarters at St. John\u2019s Terminal. But the billionaire class does not seem to be deterred by slightly off-piste locations in the era of private jets and motor courts \u2014 80 Clarkson has one, of course, with intricate metalwork, so drivers needn\u2019t unload on the street, and there\u2019s also a waiting room for them. And most new ultraluxe downtown condos are in spots that are a little weird. The success of similar downtown projects like 70 Vestry, 140 Jane and 150 Charles have also made buyers more eager to sign contracts. \u201cThere just aren\u2019t that many units downtown,\u201d says Orrigo.<\/p>\n For the Zeckendorfs, who are known for high-quality, tasteful buildings \u2014 \u201cThey think of themselves as Herm\u00e8s, Gary Barnett as Bloomingdale\u2019s, everybody else is Macy\u2019s,\u201d a source familiar with the family told The Real Deal<\/a> last summer \u2014 80 Clarkson is their first building in decades to come close to capturing the zeitgeist like 15 CPW. In 2015, the family completed 50 UN Plaza, a glassy Norman Foster tower on the far East Side whose last penthouse finally sold this December<\/a>, for $28.5 million, after first listing for $70 million in 2013. Another development, 520 Park, a limestone tower that they went back to Robert A.M. Stern Architects for, \u201cdid just okay,\u201d in the estimation of one broker. No matter how well 80 Clarkson sells, however, it will not be another 15 CPW, which was not just a buzzy building in its own right \u2014 it created a new category of luxury real estate, launching lesser imitations across Manhattan and around the world.<\/p>\n But in their downtown building, they seem to have landed on a winning formula. Vickey Barron, an associate broker at Compass who led sales at Walker Tower, the \u201cit\u201d building of a decade ago on W. 18th Street in Chelsea, says that there are a lot of things that have to click for an \u201cit\u201d building to happen. Eighty Clarkson has all the pre-requisites, she says: top-tier finishes, a sophisticated design that just hits right \u2014 moneyed without being over-the-top \u2014 and entry-level price points that are high enough to make it feel exclusive. It\u2019s also big enough to offer amenities like a squash court, a swimming pool and a private restaurant, without being so big that it feels impersonal or hotel-like. But beyond finishes and amenities, there\u2019s also an elusive quality that isn\u2019t entirely under a developer\u2019s control. What happened with Walker Tower is that it started selling via word-of-mouth among a certain circle of buyers. \u201cWalker Tower was not a great location, but once we got one celebrity in, it just took off. And we never lowered prices, we just kept on increasing them,\u201d she says. \u201cThe buyers go to the same events, the same restaurants, the same vacation spots, and they tell their friends: Oh, I just signed a contract there. The buyers call the brokers, not the other way around.\u201d In other words, something about a building captures the fancy of an elite crowd, a few key people buy there, giving it their seal of approval, and a frenzy ensues.<\/p>\n But what, exactly, is it that makes 80 Clarkson distinctive? That, as it turns out, isn\u2019t really the right question to ask when it comes to the real estate preferences of the ultrawealthy. When a broker finally shared interior renderings with me, I could see what others had been saying about the towers. The finishes are very well-executed and very forgettable: pale oak herringbone floors, marble baths and countertops, white cabinetry, large windows. It\u2019s bright, it\u2019s airy, and its rooms are designed to maximize views while leaving ample wall space for hanging art \u2014 as close to a blank canvas as you can come while still being a fully-finished luxury product. And that, brokers say, is exactly what buyers in the market for $20 million-plus apartments downtown want. \u201cI\u2019ve even heard that people are upgrading in the building,\u201d one told me. \u201cPeople who bought three beds are buying four beds now, and people who got half-floors are going to full-floors.\u201d<\/p>\n Sign Up for the Curbed Newsletter<\/p>\n A daily mix of stories about cities, city life, and our always evolving neighborhoods and skylines.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n![](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/3738b483b79a8a004085350ff32e829c12-Motor-Court---80-Clarkson-Credit-DBOX.rhorizontal.w700.jpg\")
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