Finally, Family-Friendly Bathrooms for a Popular Battery Playground

Rendering of the reimagined Battery field house that will serve as offices for park staff and, separately, restroom facilities for families using Playscape, and the SeaGlass carousel (at right). Connection between Playscape and the building will be "seamless," said Claire Weisz of WXY Architecture, designers of the reconstructed field house. Credit: WXY, NYC Parks and Battery Conservancy

Between its uniquely designed, multifaceted Playscape [1] and, nearby, the colorful, aquatic-themed carousel SeaGlass [2], The Battery has some of the city’s most fun and innovative play options for kids. What it doesn’t have for its many visitors are convenient, family-friendly restrooms. That’s going to change with the planned reconstruction of a dilapidated Parks Department field house next to Playscape that will house restroom facilities just for families.

Along with the restrooms will be new offices for Parks Department and Battery Conservancy [3] staff. A SeaGlass ticket booth, on the opposite side of the 1,900-square-foot building, is also part of the plan.

The city’s Public Design Commission approved the design of the $6.8 million project on Monday.

“We have been working on getting this project done for at least 10 years,” said Hope Cohen of the Battery Conservancy. “It’s really vital to have decent restrooms on that end of the park and particularly to serve the playground.” 

Currently men’s and women’s Parks Department rest rooms, used by the general public, are located in a nearby building.

A spiral-shaped, partially planted perforated screen will wrap around the restored building, echoing the roundness of the nearby carousel (and hiding the building’s mechanical systems). Where the spiral opens will be the SeaGlass ticket booth. “It’s supposed to be something that doesn’t dominate the Playscape but that will be appealing to walk into,” said Claire Weisz of WXY Architecture [4], designers of the new structure as well as SeaGlass.

Each of the building’s two unisex “comfort stations,” as the Park Department calls them, will have both adult and child-height toilets and sinks, and diaper changing tables. Another sink will serve both bathroom units. Most of the building will be used for offices and other facilities for park staff.

Starr Whitehouse Landscape Architects and Planners [5], the Playscape designers with BKSK Architects [6], have extended their design for Playscape so that the connection between the playground and building “should be seamless and make it look like it was always there,” Weisz said. 

The building is scheduled to open by Spring 2028.

The Public Design Commission approval was unanimous. “It is such an elegant example of the kind of adaptive reuse of the structure that respects the original structure but also makes it into something new and current,” said Deborah Marton, the commission’s president. “It’s a really beautiful example of that.”