Developers of the Anagram apartment tower under construction on the Gowanus Canal released new images of the project, which will have 158 rental units, stores and offices.
The building at 450 Union St. is rising to 20 stories above the once toxic, (mostly) cleaned-up waterway that emerged as the neighborhood’s scenic centerpiece.
The project by Global Holdings, MacArthur Holdings and Brooklyn-based Tankhouse, designed by architectural firm SO-IL, will include a public waterfront esplanade. Leasing will start in early 2027.
Gowanus has enjoyed a rental-apartment boom since the city rezoned 82 blocks in the area. A record 4,000 new units were created in 2025, with a total of 9,000 projected eventually.
Yet despite the neighborhood’s undeniable appeal, a tendentious New York magazine article this month questioned why anyone would want to live there and strained to cast shade on the whole Gowanus scene.
But writing in the Manhattan Institute’s indispensable City Journal, Mark Gimein, a happy Gowanus resident, called out the article for embracing the “backwards logic that permeates discussions of development” — i.e., complaints that no affordable new housing is “affordable” enough and obsession with overblown environmental issues that trouble few people other than woke ideologues.
