You might not anticipate major scientific innovation in Long Island City, better known for its arts and culture scene. Just a couple blocks from MoMA PS1, however, a recently completed lab facility designed by Perkins&Will marks a notable development in the area’s burgeoning life sciences industry. Innolabs, a 25,000-square-metre adaptive re-use project, faces the street boldly and creates a striking counterpoint to the historic neighbourhood. A slender black steel and glass addition provides a muscular contrast to the white historic facade of the original structure, driving home the former office building’s unexpected second life.

“There are two compelling reasons why adaptive re-use of older buildings is viable for labs — one is that it’s generally less expensive than a new build, and the second is speed to market,” explains William Harris, regional managing director at Perkins&Will. “If tenants can get into their labs faster, they can ultimately get their products to trials and market faster.”

Innolabs is Boston-based King Street Properties’ first foray into New York City, but it’s not an outlier. Lab-based tenancies are increasingly seen as a stable post-pandemic real estate investment, and Long Island City is one of a few decentralized life science districts emerging throughout NYC; in neighbourhoods where access to transit and nearby medical institutions haven’t precluded affordable land costs, new developments seek to appeal to this kind of start-up.

These tenants can grow quickly, requiring maximum rental pliancy. Astutely, Perkins&Will seized on a key strategy during preplanning: “We were able to move the bathrooms and elevators to the side of the building, inside the front extension,” Harris says, “opening the space and allowing us to more flexibly fit one, two or three tenants per floor.” Without a central core, the sprawling T-shaped building is replete with sunlit laboratory spaces ready for partitioning.

While the open labs are complemented by closed support rooms and serviced by ceiling-integrated utility systems, different tenants are able to reconfigure the set-up depending on their individual needs.

Centralized amenities help enable the unique social environment of life science facilities. Relocating the original lobby entrance to the side of the building freed up space for a stylish café kiosk with exposed brick and tiered wooden benches, as well as a shared and subdividable multi-purpose event space. “In an office building with multiple tenants, they don’t often talk to each other,” Harris explains. “With lab buildings, there’s a sense of community among the tenants. It’s very important to support that.”