Upper East Side, New YorkPark Avenue Penthouse
This Park Avenue penthouse called for a restrained landscape that would complement the character of the interiors rather than compete with them. Wrapping around the apartment, the terraces are visible from several of the principal rooms, making the landscape an important part of the interior experience as well as a series of outdoor spaces in their own right.
A simple palette of evergreen planting and white-flowering hydrangeas creates a calm, consistent framework throughout. Custom blackened stainless-steel planters were designed by DEA to establish a strong architectural edge to the terraces, with clipped boxwood providing year-round structure and hydrangeas introducing a softer seasonal layer. The restrained palette allows the furniture, architecture and expansive views across Manhattan to remain the focus.
Because the apartment forms part of a New York cooperative, the design and installation required close communication with the building management throughout the process, ensuring that proposals, detailing and construction requirements were carefully coordinated. DEA also worked closely with the project architect and interior decorator at key stages in the development of the design. This collaboration was particularly important given the visibility of the terraces from within the apartment: the proportions, materials and positioning of the custom planters, together with the height and rhythm of the boxwood hedging, were considered in relation to the principal interior rooms and their sightlines. Rather than treating the terraces as separate exterior spaces, the landscape was developed as an extension of the architecture and interiors.
Elsewhere, a custom blackened stainless-steel trellis was designed to support climbing ivy and create a more intimate seating area adjoining the residence. Conceived as an architectural feature in its own right, the trellis provides structure while the planting establishes. As the ivy matures, it forms a continuous green backdrop, bringing depth, privacy and enclosure to this quieter corner of the terrace.
