Gehry’s first playground will be in Battery Park

Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe, left, Frank Gehry, Mayor Bloomberg, Battery Conservancy President Warrie Price, Battery Conservancy Chairperson Bill Rudin after the mayor announced Gehry would design aplayground in Battery Park.

World famous architect Frank Gehry has designed Spain’s Guggenheim Museum, Los Angeles’ Walt Disney Concert Hall and Prague’s Dancing House. His first playground design, however, will be in Lower Manhattan.

Gehry attended the Battery Conservancy’s 12th annual WaterGazer Gala benefit in Battery Park Tuesday, when Mayor Bloomberg and Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe announced that the architect would design a new playground in the park. The Parks Department said the design will be released later this year and that no start date for construction has been set yet.

Warrie Price, the Battery Conservancy’s president, said when Gehry first approached her last May, he was impressed with the new design improvements in the park. She’s excited to have such a renowned architect design part of the park.

“He said, ‘I’m getting older and I want to get things done,’” Price said.

Gehry, 78, will be donating his design free of charge. “I’d like to thank Frank Gehry for his extraordinary gift tonight,” Mayor Bloomberg said at the gala. “It’s something that should make everybody feel even more optimistic about the future of the Battery and Lower Manhattan.”

The city has put aside $4 million to cover construction costs for the one-acre playground. Starr Whitehouse will be the landscape architects on the project. Price said the conservancy is raising money for the landscaping. The American Express Foundation has awarded them a grant for $750,000 already.

This will be Gehry’s third Lower Manhattan project. He is also designing the theater performance space in the World Trade Center, and the 75-story residential tower and K- 8 school on Beekman St.

His IAC/InterActiveCorp. headquarters on the Chelsea waterfront opened this year.

The new playground will also be right across the path from the long awaited SeaGlass carousel. The conservancy has almost raised enough money to build the fish carousel, with the help of a $750,000 donation from Borough President Scott Stringer. Price said she was hopeful that Councilmember Alan Gerson and Mayor Bloomberg would put the rest of the needed money in this year’s budget with each contributing $2 million out of their discretionary funds.

“We’re creating unique innovative projects Downtown and that’s what Downtown should be known for,” she said. “We’re certainly unique with our history and our seaport.”

The playground will feature a “green” restroom, with a green roof and walls covered with plants (to absorb pollution). The new play space will replace the park’s current playground located near the southeast end of the park.

“The equipment in the park is just about 30 years old and while it’s been maintained by the park, it doesn’t have the imagination that we think would make the park the space kids would want to come into,” Price said.

That’s where Gehry comes in.

— Anindita Dasgupta