Welcome back, Vessel!
At long last, the iconic vertical sculpture and sightseeing platform at Hudson Yards will become a hive of activity again on Monday, reopening to the public after more than three years.
The gently tweaked, 16-story architectural folly is now safe for everyone and was worth the wait.
Hudson Yards developer Related Companies closed the honeycomb-like structure in August 2021 following four tragic deaths by suicide.
Related and designer Thomas Heatherwick took more than two years to come up with a redesign that put in new safety measures, while preserving the copper-tinted colossus’ architectural integrity and stupendous views from its many levels.
The Vessel now has spidery, protective floor-to-ceiling steel mesh screens on every floor above the second except the top one, where the lack of a ceiling prevented its installation. As a result, the floor remains closed.
The hexagonal-pattern mesh is so delicate, it’s almost invisible from less than 100 feet away. You see it when you’re on any of the structure’s surfaces, but it doesn’t get in the way of views.
A tour led by Hudson Yards chief operating officer Andrew Rosen revealed that Vessel’s maze of interlocked stairways and platforms are as much fun as they were previously.
But not all of the 80 landings and 154 flights of steps are open to the public.
Related decided to close off the uptown-facing side above the second level, at least for the time being. But the best views are to the south.
The first and second floors remain entirely open and without the mesh barriers.
Related Cos. CEO Jeff T. Blau said in a statement that the Vessel “was always designed to be entered and explored.
There is overwhelming demand from the public to do that. Not a day goes by that we don’t have visitors asking where they can buy tickets and when it will reopen.”
Former Related Cos. chairman CEO Stephen M. Ross first told us in 2016 that Hudson Yards would soon have an iconic structure to rival the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
He might have overstated things.
But the $200 million-plus Vessel opened in March 2019 and quickly became one of the world’s most photographed (and Instagrammed) locations.
Its reopening after 2021 remained uncertain until The Post broke the news last April that it would happen by the end of 2024.
Admission is $10 as it was before the closure. Visitors from New York City who show proof of residency are admitted free on Thursdays.
