Pong was one of the first, and commercially successful, video games created. The idea was simple. Players could replicate real-life ping-pong with digitally animated blocks.
Now, more than 50 years later, a Pong-type game has debuted in an unusual place: One Liberty Plaza, one of Manhattan’s largest office towers.
The permanent interactive art installation is part of Brookfield Properties’ $40 million revamp of the building’s lobby, the latest example of how amenities are becoming integral in the race to attract tenants.
The piece, “A:: Light” by renowned artist Pierre Huyghe, is positioned as a light-up grid that hangs down from the ceiling. It's visible from outside the building and playable by visitors using controllers from the floor of the lobby.
Brookfield has overhauled the 54-story, 2.3 million-square-foot One Liberty Plaza for the first time since the 1980s, according to Alex Liscio, Brookfield’s senior vice president of asset management. The project also features double-height interior spaces with new finishes and a glass facade that lets in more natural light, he said.
“The lobby is an extension of the workplace, and it's not just a place that you pass through in the morning or at lunchtime or after work,” Liscio told CoStar News. “We’ve really leaned into the arts as a way to activate our spaces. … This is a step beyond that. … We’re confident that this lobby repositioning is going to create tremendous value.”
He declined to specify how the Financial District building is faring, except to say it’s “well leased.” Brookfield’s other New York office properties include Brookfield Place west of the World Trade Center complex and the Manhattan West portfolio near Hudson Yards and Penn Station.
One Liberty Plaza is 88.1% leased, according to CoStar data. It opened in 1972 and counts among its tenants law firm Cleary Gottlieb, Aon Consulting, the New York City Economic Development Corp., and media company Business Insider.
Liscio, without offering details, said Brookfield is “very bullish on rental growth downtown.”
Improving office amenities is one way employers hope they can entice workers back to the office post-pandemic, analysts have said. About three-quarters of employees view “socializing as the main motivation,” a JLL study found, highlighting that “the office is no longer just a place to work; it's a social hub, a cultural epicenter, and a collaborative playground.”
For Huyghe, the work marked the first time the French artist’s work, which has been displayed in New York’s Museum of Modern Art and other famed global galleries, has been installed outside a museum, Jacob King of Fine Art Concepts, who advised Brookfield, told CoStar News.
The work took a year of fabrication in Los Angeles, which involved figuring out how to build it and get it on the ceiling in New York. The installation itself took 14 straight days, King said. “For an artwork, that’s a really long installation.”