Enhancing the city’s public health response

The New York City Public Health Laboratory (PHL) has been a critical tool to respond to public health crises in New York for more than a century. Established in 1892 to address the diphtheria outbreak, PHL was the first municipal bacteriological laboratory in the world. More recently, it was the first laboratory in the city to perform COVID-19 testing. The new building—to be located adjacent to the Harlem Hospital complex on 137th Street—will replace the existing laboratory in Kips Bay with a modern and flexible facility to equip the institution to respond to a variety of pressing public health issues.

The new building will offer testing and monitoring services for a wide range of clinical and environmental health concerns to provide advanced facilities for the laboratory’s numerous focus areas.

A form befitting its function

The building is organized in two parts: a three-story masonry podium housing essential support functions and community programs, and a series of laboratory floors rising above in the form of an urban-scale, glass cube with a partial green roof between the two.

The laboratory tower is characterized by its structural diagrid and corresponding diagonal glass and metal cladding. The volume steps out to the south as it rises, accommodating laboratories of different sizes and providing passive solar shading. Looking at wellness holistically, the building is designed to comply with New York City’s new, ambitious resiliency and sustainability regulations.

A neighborhood resource

While the building is a critical testing laboratory with secured access, it is nonetheless designed to act as a resource for the community in which it sits, incorporating an auditorium and training lab for the neighborhood. The training lab will provide students in Harlem with the opportunity to learn about healthcare and encourage careers in laboratory science.