New York City Council’s Subcommittee on Zoning and Franchises and Committee on Land Use voted to approve the Midtown South Mixed-use rezoning plan that greenlights 9,500-plus new homes, including more than 2,800 permanently affordable homes.
Prior to Wednesday’s unanimous vote, New York City Mayor Eric Adams and the department of city planning championed the plan, despite some fashion-related businesses speaking out publicly about the potential toll on fashion-related tenants. City Council members Erik Bottcher and Keith Powers, whose respective districts fall within the area, responded to some fashion-related appeals.
Known as MSMX, the rezoning impacts four areas centered around Herald and Greeley Squares and located roughly between West 23rd and West 40th Streets and Fifth and Eighth Avenues, with the Garment District comprising a portion of that. In addition to housing, the plan aims to strengthen Midtown South’s economy and bolster jobs through light manufacturing, office space and retail. The Garment District is the hub of the $400 billion American fashion industry. Fashion employs 180,000-plus people in New York and generates more than $11 billion in wages annually.
The plan will lead to residential development in a neighborhood where it is largely scarce, and will include affordable housing for the first time. It will come with $488 million in community benefits and infrastructure improvements, geared for the Garment District and businesses, as well as parks, public transit, and other neighborhood resources. Some of the new initiatives are meant to further set up Midtown South as a center of creativity, craftsmanship and economic opportunity.
Established between 1900 and 1925 for apparel manufacturing, the neighborhood remained that way for decades until some manufacturers started to head south. The district’s fashion-related jobs decreased after more domestic manufacturing shifted offshore in the 1970s and 1980s, and then the North American Free Trade Agreement further impacted domestic jobs and production. As some fashion companies moved out to more affordable neighborhoods or closed, the neighborhood’s vacant spaces were leased by nonfashion businesses, hotels and nonprofits.
Employees at work at a glove manufacturer in the Garment District.
Photo by Jacob Grumulaitis
Generations of American designers including Donna Karan, Calvin Klein, Vera Wang, Tommy Hilfiger, Bill Blass, Oscar de la Renta, Carolina Herrera, Adolfo, Stephen Burrows, Thom Browne, Prabal Gurung, Liz Claiborne, Claire McCardell, Bonnie Cashin, Norman Norell and others established their companies in the Garment District. In the past decade though, numerous designers, especially younger ones, have opted to run their businesses in other parts of Manhattan, outer boroughs and in some instances other states, where commercial rents are more affordable.
With Wednesday’s vote, the City Council secured more than $121.9 million in programs and partnerships for the Garment District including preserving manufacturing, offering up to $25 million in tax abatements to support the preservation of industrial space, restarting the M-Core program to support the creation of below-market space, offering $50 million in the Greenlight Innovation Fund, launching the CFDA Local Production Fund with $1.8 million in public-private funding, continued investment in the Garment District Alliance’s $2.5 million per year Business Development Collaborative, and debuting Midtown Made to support designers, manufacturers and entrepreneurs.
Acknowledging the city’s support of New York City’s fashion industry, the Council of Fashion Designers of America is pleased to see the fashion sector’s concerns reflected in the plan, according to Steven Kolb, chief executive officer and president of the CFDA. He noted the CFDA Local Production Fund “underscores a shared belief in sustaining garment manufacturing and independent design in the city.”
According to Kolb, the CFDA appreciates Bottcher and Powers, Mayor Adams’ administration and the New York City Economic Development Corp. meeting with the CFDA and directly addressing its interests, “ensuring that creativity, industry and community remain at the center of Midtown’s future.”
“It’s also important to us that the plan prioritizes funding requirements for the Garment District Alliance, which will now operate with greater transparency and include industry representation on the selection committee. We welcome the continued investment in workforce training, below-market production space and branding initiatives that support and elevate local designers and manufacturers,” Kolb said.
The Council also secured more than $340 million for street improvements, upgrades to parks, playgrounds, local MTA subway stations and bus routes, and funding for local hospitals and emergency medical services. Investments in local schools like the High School of Fashion Industries will also get a boost.
Last year, advocates for the New York Fashion Workforce Coalition rallied together over concern that buildings would be demolished and manufacturing would be diminished with the rezoning. However, increasing the allowable floor area ratio and the use of air rights have upped the neighborhood’s property value and the coalition’s activism, according to supporter Katie Sue Nicklos, CEO and owner of Wing & Weft Gloves.
As a small business owner and glove maker in the rezoning area, she said she is really hopeful that “the city’s commitment to fashion, theater and entertainment will not only preserve our ecosystem, but also begin to rebuild what we know could be here and that has been worn away,” Nicklos said.
Encouraged that nearly 20 percent of the MSMX plan has been carved out to be nonresidential — versus all of it initially, she also praised the city’s efforts to support designers and makers in the neighborhood. Most importantly, there will be some oversight of the new program between the coalition and a point person at the NYCEDC, who has not yet been named, Nicklos said. The aim is to ensure the programs are working and available to the area’s network of 200 to 300 small businesses “so that they know what’s possible and to drive businesses to the district,” Nicklos said.
“The most important thing is that the city listened to us. A whole bunch of people got together to lend their voices to protect our cultural impact not only on New York, but the city, the state — the world really,” she said. “The most important part to note is that the city doesn’t take our industry for granted. They are doing the right thing in moving forward and protecting our industry.”
Peg Breen, president of the New York Landmarks Conservancy, said the businesses and people, who work in the Garment District, deserve a lot of credit for being “very persuasive and very persistent.” Pleased as she was that some of the area’s buildings will be protected, Breen said the notion that some city officials consider some of the others to be tear-downs is rather startling.
The city recently named five buildings as New York Landmarks — the Barbey Building at 15 West 38th Street, the Fashion Tower at 135 West 36th Street, the Furcraft Building at 242-246 West 30th Street, the 29th Street Towers at 214 and 224 West 29th Street and the Lefcourt Clothing Center at 275 Fifth Avenue. There are plenty more substantial buildings that could be individual landmarks, and are already eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places, Breen said. “I don’t think there’s a need to take any of them down. If the others can be converted to housing without demolishing, that’s great,” she said.
Noting how the Midtown South project overlaps with two historic districts — part of Ladies’ Mile and Midtown South, Breen said, “They should just leave historic districts alone. All of the historic districts put together make up only 5 percent of the entire city.“
While new buildings and modifications to existing ones are allowed in historic districts, they are meant to blend in with the rest of the area, Breen said. “Historic districts are important to the city in terms of quality of life and our identity,” she said.
Part of the draw of rezoning Midtown South was the prospect of converting commercial buildings that were no longer appropriate or in use into housing, Breen said. “That’s a terrific idea and that should be done. The jury is out about whether letting developers build taller and taller buildings is going to solve our problems for the housing.”
In a statement, Adams said that with Wednesday’s vote, “We’re taking another step forward in helping to create a more dynamic Midtown South where New Yorkers of all income levels can live, work and play. Not only will this plan deliver thousands of new homes for this central neighborhood, but it also represents a down payment on our vision of 100,000 new homes across all of Manhattan over the next decade.”
