Stephanie Goto: You Can Do Something Special in the Forgotten Spaces

Architect Stephanie Goto rethinks how we use space. Photo by Alex Fradkin.

High up on a roof overlooking Union Square sits a jewel box in the sky. In 2017, architect Stephanie Goto transformed an old shed there into her studio, a 1,500-square-foot space wrapped in windows and mirrored black stainless steel. It feels more like a home — complete with a modern kitchen and dining table that seats 10 — than any New York City office.

Goto, who during the height of the pandemic transformed the iconic flagship Restaurant Daniel into Boulud Sur Mer and extended the dining experience to the sidewalk bungalows for longtime client Daniel Boulud, has been rethinking how we define space by blurring the boundaries well before we started using the term “hybrid workplace.” As we consider the office of the future, Goto pushes us to think beyond the working-from-home-forever and back-to-the-office-like-nothing-ever-happened dichotomy and design more dimensional workspaces.

Rather than build another mixed-use commercial skyscraper complex in midtown, can we recapture New York City’s forgotten spaces? Can we turn underutilized or overlooked in-between spaces, into flexible workspaces for independent creators? And what if we go so far as to replace desks for employees to redefine the space as they move around?

Here, Goto shares how she designed New York City’s coolest workspace and why meaningful opportunities to reimagine how we work are found in the city’s forgotten spaces.

Stephanie Goto’s workspace is a jewel box in the sky overlooking Union Square in New York City. Image: Adrian Gaut.

Where does this story start?

Since its inception, my studio has called Union Square home, and I live nearby. In 2015, I was searching online for new office space and I discovered 19 Union Square West. There wasn’t a lot of detail, but it said there was a 9,000-square-foot space available on the 12th floor. On top of that, connected by stairs, I discovered there was a 1,500-square-foot shed on the roof. I quickly realized I knew the owner of that building through the philanthropic work I do on the Carnegie Hall Real Estate Council.

9,000 square feet was much more than I needed, so I thought about how I could assemble a group of colleagues to share this incredible space. But, even divided by four organizations, the $700,000+/year rent was more than we wanted to invest. I also thought about how I could bring in colleagues in the event business who could host events on the 12th floor, and I could have my studio on the roof. When we analyzed all the numbers, it didn’t make sense. I proposed to the landlord to rent me just the shed on the roof — it literally was a shed.

How did the landlord respond?

At first, the landlord said that was lopping off the best part of the space. I was determined to convince him that I could bring value to the building and proceeded to create a rendering of what the space could be, a jewel box on the roof. I presented this beautiful, modern pavilion to the building owners and explained how it would be the crown in their building. I had also found the original certificate of occupancy while searching through the microfilm of the documents on the building. It had been missing from the record, and it stated the penthouse use was as an office with a kitchen. And so I managed to convince them. It took about seven months to negotiate the lease. Then it took almost a year to construct the space.

Every New Yorker has an epic moving story. What’s yours?

The fact that all of the building materials and furniture needed to be carried up one flight of stairs from the 12th floor to the roof meant we needed to carefully consider how everything fit through the stairwell. The space has a 30-foot window to the north that is on the edge of the building, so we had to put that glass in from the inside very carefully. We surgically cut the window opening into the existing exterior facade and lifted pieces of glass into the wall. Meanwhile, I was doing this while running my practice. It was a stressful time.

The original space needed work and vision. Image: Stephanie Goto

Once completed, the space was completely transformed. Image: Richard Pare. © 2021 Calder Foundation, New York/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Your studio speaks to creatively using the “forgotten” spaces in New York. When you look out at the city, what overlooked places can we recapture and reimagine?

There are so many ways to enrich the existing fabric of New York if we look beyond what we can see. Taking over the urban edge and inhabiting the sidewalk last summer, extending Restaurant Daniel into the city was impactful and had an incredible feeling. It’s in the forgotten spaces that you can do something special. I would propose to consider the left over alleyway-like spaces and rooftops. It doesn’t have to have views to be valuable; you need to think about how you transform the found spaces in a way that speaks to your business and how we interact especially after this long year of being apart. There are safety and code regulations that of course need to be considered; perhaps we need to think about creating a modular space, like a pod, that can be nomadic or be transformed. It’s one way to look at future spaces.

Another aspect to consider is older buildings that have been left abandoned or spaces within them that have been underutilized, that have some historic character and relate back to a certain time in history. You could retain the exterior or structure and then insert this other hidden secret world inside. What better time than now to start exploring, so these spaces can breathe a new life.

Tell us about your space’s history.

My space was part of the home and studio of the iconic creative director Jean-Paul Goude. Grace Jones was his girlfriend in the 1970s, so there are pictures of Grace Jones on my rooftop, in the fire stairwell, and lots of stories about what happened in Jean-Paul Goude’s studio. That history and their lives in the space along with some other notable occupants tell a special story. It is very New York.

The workspace is multi-dimensional, providing options on where to create. Image: Richard Pare. © 2021 Calder Foundation, New York/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York.

How do you view the space in your studio?

The studio space is an extension of who I am, and what I do. It's not just an office space; there is a blurring of the lines. During the day, it’s a studio space and we’re using the dining table as a meeting table and on occasion to make models. Then sometimes at night, it is transformed into a dining experience and I collaborate with my chef friends to create multi-sensory experiences. It allows me to extend what I do in my architectural practice into all these other layers of experience. It’s not just about the space; it's what you feel, what you see, taste, hear, smell and touch. It is about all the senses.

How might we design our post-pandemic workspaces, so they better fit into the hybrid way of working?

Flexibility and duality is essential, so that people can activate the space and it can be multiple things. Perhaps we have become too comfortable in creating typical office spaces and we need to have a more reduced approach where things are not as permanent. As we rethink office spaces, the question I ask is: What is essential for you? Is a desk essential? Is a lounge space essential? Is that coffee bar still in play? Or is it more about not defining the space as one thing and allowing the daily rituals to tell the story?

In our studio, the stainless steel monoblock island we have as the centerpiece of the kitchen is a beautiful object, it can be used as a Champagne bar and a sushi counter, but it's also a place where you can have an intimate discussion and sketch out an idea. It is where I gather with my team to share tea. My mantra is not to give functions to every single thing, but allow them to define themselves as you move around and use the space.

Your space is going to make a lot of people jealous. When is your lease up?

It will be home base for a long time.

If you’d like to read more from The Creative Factor—such as Morten Bonde’s story about reinventing himself as a LEGO Art Director while losing his sight or Edése Doret: Inside the Mind-Boggling World of Private Jet Design—sign up for our newsletter.