Gentle touch breathes new life into old fish market.

With the exception of three storefronts that have yet to be snatched up and the redesign of Pecks Slip, the final phase in the redevelopment of the Fulton Street Fish Market has been completed offering as testament proof that it is still possible for a project to retain the historic flavor of a neighborhood in lieu of the cloned shopping mall that much of Manhattan has become.

Though the brackish scent of fish no longer corrodes the air and doctors now live where the prostitutes did, if you walk around the neighborhood you can still glimpse the facade of its ramshackle past. The glue factories Edith Wharton's family owned, the flophouses where sailors were regularly "shanghaied" by crimps hired by ship captains seeking indentured labor; the cobblestone streets where Herman Melville launched Ishamel in his classic novel Moby Dick, and fishmongers yielding hooks pedaled their stocks for over a century all left their marks on the modern day multi million dollar condo lofts and trendy shops and restaurants.

"There was a sense of authenticity to this project that dates back to the 19th century and was unlike any project I had ever worked on before in my life," said Rick Cook, principal of Cook plus Fox Architects who worked on a $46 million project restoring eleven buildings and creating three new buildings for residential use along Front Street.

"Many of these buildings were left untouched and unrestored, which lead to their almost romantic state of collapse. It was in many ways the land that time forgot and so the challenge here was much more than technical, it was a kind of a poetic challenge, to respect the history and sense of authenticity of this place."

Everyone who worked on the development of the area, including Zuberry Associates LLC and the Durst Organization, Sciame Construction, Cook Plus Fox Architects and JDF Realty--which incorporated 95 units of residential and retail units on 36 different lands--were discriminating about the retailers they chose.

The bulk of the 11 clients who rented moved into their stores by the beginning of this year and include several locally owned bars/restaurants, Firefly--a children's boutique with an outlet in Brooklyn--a dry cleaner, a European design kitchen showroom, Jack's Coffee shop from the West Village, and a pet supply and grooming company.

"We said right off the bat we didn't want the Subways and Blimpies and Walgreens of the world to move in here. The idea of this project was to maintain the character and eclecticness of the neighborhood, to create a sense of community where the retailers would know each other and support each other," said Robert Frischman, president of JDF Realty.

"We, the developers, the architects, the brokers, all had the common goal of creating a street where people could come and bring their baby strollers and their dogs and get their dry cleaning done and then have dinner and go home. There have been local people who have been living down there for the last ten years that have not been serviced in their own neighborhood."

Frischman said people were attracted to the neighborhood both by its character and the fact that it is actually affordable. "All of a sudden, people want to get a store at $75 per s/f they can't get for less than $150 psf uptown," he said.

The transition was tricky. Though the Fish Market was not actually uprooted to the Bronx until late 2005, the neighborhood had been falling into a state of decline highlighted by an archaic Request for Proposals process for over two decades. The area had been so dilapidated, the New York State Landmarks Commission actually raised money to do emergency repairs, swathing the crumbling buildings in netting so mortar didn't tumble to the ground. When Dick Berry, principal of Zuberry Associates LLC, and a long time member of the Seaman's Institute, finally contracted to develop the area, they had their work cut out for them.

"Everyone thought that the moment the Fish Market left, the area it would become a pristine South Street Seaport type of attraction, and in many ways it would have been much easier to go along with the grain of what everyone else is doing and develop it that way. We really fought that impulse and were able to retain the neighborhood's scale and appearance building by building, and retain its integrity. There was a strong push in the neighborhood to preserve that character. You really can't rebuild something so historic, you can't replicate it, "Berry said.

The group had to go against the grain of conventional restoration techniques to fortify the buildings while retaining as much of the facades battle scars as they could. Working from the inside out, rather than the outside in, they drilled holes in the buckling parts of walls and used a giant syringe-like tool to inject grout into them. This technique allowed them to stabilize many of the walls without requiring they be repointed, and saved many of the walls from having to be taken down to be repaired. Repair work was done with a light hand, old signs, and weathered details of the building, such as scars on the walls, and windows and floorboards at slightly odd angles, were retained and marketed to residents for their "funky" qualities.

"We liked to tell people who were looking at places that if you would be disturbed if your sunny side up egg could never be cooked with a perfectly shaped yolk this might not be the place for you. But if you have appreciate a more funky look and have a slightly different outlook on life you will fit in here," Zuberry said.

"New Yorkers have a great sense of humor and a great sense of creativity. In New York there are always enough people that they like almost anything. New Yorkers are wonderful people to do this kind of work for," he said.

Prior to creating the buildings, the architects hired a photographer to take photos of the "ghosts" of the neighborhood--the abandoned parking lots where buildings once stood, the aged signs--and completed a plethora of research to try and highlight some of the neighborhood's past.

To compensate for the fact that many of the buildings in the project were originally single client warehouses and counting houses with no lobbies, they built courtyards and passageways through the courtyards where residents could enter that did not require the installation of too many elevators or stairs, or break up the flow of the place.

Other groundbreaking elements incorporated into the project include green features, such as 1,500 foot deep standing column geothermal wells, and green roofs which are currently featured as part of a green exhibit at the National Building museum and paved the way for the firm to do other large scale green projects, such as the Bank of America tower.

Other aspects of the neighborhood that have yet to be put out to bid--such as plans for Peck Slip on the waterfront--are expected to draw on the well of history and go against the grain of conventional building. Plans that had been discussed in the past include turning the slip into a piazza like park, and bringing water back into the now parched slip in memory of its original status.

All the players involved hope that their work will help pave the way for other restoration projects in the future.

"We feel great about the quality of the streetscape. This project is a good study on how we can do a different type of streetscaping that respects place and history, courtyards and natural light rather than always going for the maximum highrise," Cook said.