Renzo Piano Building Workshop puts the finishing touches on 600 W. 125th residential tower for Columbia University

Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW) is progressing towards the completion of its new 600 W. 125th Street off-campus Harlem housing project for Columbia University in collaboration with CetraRuddy.

Once complete, the 34-story dorm is set to host 142 apartments for graduate students and faculty with another 5,000-square-foot McDonald’s retail location included at the ground level. Thornton Tomasetti is in charge of delivering the building’s facade system. The construction has been engineered to meet LEED v4.0 Gold certification standards and culminates in a total of 177,000 square-feet, including its terraced podium.

The project is being realized just a few blocks south of the southern edge of Manhattanville, Columbia’s sometimes fraught 17-acre multiphase development that has to date included three other RPBW buildings (the Jerome L. Greene Science Center, Lenfest Center f...