Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/603573
258 CULTURED and a private residence for her family. "She has an extraordinary aesthetic," Berke says of Boesky, "and a sophisticated palette." In New York, Berke designed an 11-story, ground-up co-op at 48 Bond Street, but has perhaps become best known for her adaptive recycling of historic buildings. "It's an environmentally sound thing and it's alchemy for the city involved," she says. Besides the nine 21c Museum Hotels, she is redoing the Richardson Olmsted Complex—a 19th century landmarked building, that was formerly a state hospital facility, in Buffalo, New York—as a boutique hotel. But lest anyone think she does only ground-hugging projects and historic buildings, she also did the interior design and floor plans for Rafael Viñoly's 1,396-foot-tall residential tower at 432 Park Avenue, which is the tallest residential building in the Western Hemisphere (that is, until 225 West 57th Street opens next year). "I would say building in New York is more expensive and often more time consuming," Berke says. "It's easier elsewhere, but it's never easy." Similarly, she tried to come up with challenging projects for her graduate-level studio at Yale, which she says she will probably not teach next year, but wants to continue after that. "The subject always changed, because I was always interested in something new," she says. One year it was not just adaptive reuse of a distillery, but a chance, she says, "to look at job opportunities in Louisville, and the many reasons to offer that." Another year it was not just a project in Iceland, but also Internet privacy. Albert Einstein said, "The important thing is to not stop questioning." Berke puts it another way; "Retire? Never!" "Most schools are roughly 50-50 men and women. If we can encourage these women to stay in architecture that would be fantastic. But that's not what's happening." —Deborah Berke Deborah Berke Partners designed this residential compound in Bridgehampton and, at right, Bard College Conservatory of Music at Annandale-on-Hudson in New York. PHOTO BY JASON SCHMIDT(EAST END); CHRIS COOPER (BARD)