26-05-2025
- Business
- Wall Street Journal
In New York, a $370,000 Renovation Gave an Awkward Living Space Better Flow
Joe McGuier and Megan Prime, co-founders of JAM, a Brooklyn-based architecture and interiors studio, rarely try to talk clients out of a big project. This couple couldn't decide between apartments in two Fifth Avenue buildings. One had two smaller, but more modern units that JAM would gut and combine into one apartment, the other was a prewar condo that was large, but poorly laid out. McGuier didn't hesitate to steer them to the simpler project in the prewar building. 'The single apartment was already quite spacious, but it had this awkward living-dining room-entry,' he says. 'We told them if we combine these rooms, you'll have an amazing space with six windows overlooking the park.'
The clients, who are in their early 40s and work in finance and the arts, were near closing on the two-apartment option. Instead, they shifted gears and paid just under $6 million for the single condo. The renovation time—an important consideration for a family with two children—was under a year versus two-plus years to combine units.
