New images released this week show the Anagram Gowanus tower taking shape at 450 Union Street, where a 20-story building with 158 rental units is rising directly along the Gowanus Canal. The developers behind the project released the renderings as construction continues on what has become one of the most closely watched additions to Brooklyn's once-industrial waterfront.
According to the New York Post, the tower is being developed by a partnership of Global Holdings, MacArthur Holdings and Brooklyn-based Tankhouse, with design work led by SO-IL. The architecture firm SO-IL is handling the creative vision for the project, while Magnusson Architecture & Planning serves as architect of record, according to nyrej.com. The building will include stores, offices and a public waterfront esplanade along the canal, per the Post's reporting.
What's Inside the 203,000-Square-Foot Building
The tower is set to include about 22,000 square feet of commercial and retail space, according to nyrej.com, with nyrej.com specifying that the footprint includes areas designated for community and art-studio use. The same nyrej.com report describes a 5,700-square-foot waterfront esplanade that will connect to adjacent walkways along the canal, giving pedestrians a continuous path near the water. Structural engineering firm Thornton Tomasetti notes that the overall building totals 203,000 square feet and houses the 158 residential units.
Because the site sits within a FEMA AE flood zone, Thornton Tomasetti says the project's flood-mitigation strategy is designed to meet both New York City Building Code and FEMA requirements. Construction topped out on the building in January, according to New York YIMBY, marking a milestone in a build that has moved steadily skyward along the canal's edge.
Conflicting Timelines for Completion and Leasing
Exactly when Anagram Gowanus will be finished remains unsettled in the available reporting. New York YIMBY states the project is scheduled for completion in the second quarter of 2027, while CityRealty's market coverage says completion is anticipated for late 2026. The Post, meanwhile, reports that leasing is expected to begin in early 2027. None of those timelines have been reconciled publicly, and the discrepancy underscores how fluid construction schedules can be for large waterfront towers still finishing out their interiors.
Part of a Bigger Gowanus Building Boom
Anagram Gowanus is rising in the wake of the city's 2021 rezoning, which upzoned an 82-block swath of Gowanus, according to City Limits. That rezoning was projected to add roughly 8,500 apartments to the neighborhood by 2035, with about 3,000 of those units expected to be affordable, per the same report. The Post adds that Gowanus is projected to eventually see 9,000 total new units, and that roughly 4,000 new rental units were created in the neighborhood in 2025 alone.
The Gowanus Canal itself, long known as a toxic waterway, is described by the Post as mostly cleaned up at this point, even as a broader Superfund cleanup effort continues. Commercial Observer reports that the canal is in the process of an extensive cleanup designed to convert the waterway into a neighborhood amenity, and notes that land values nearby have climbed sharply — from about $40 per square foot in 2011 to a level likely near $300 per square foot today, according to JLL's Christopher Peck, as cited by Commercial Observer.
Anagram is far from the only project reshaping the canal corridor. Commercial Observer's reporting points to Charney Companies and Tavros Capital's 175 Third Street, a 27-story, 1.1-million-square-foot building planned with more than 1,000 rental apartments, including roughly 250 affordable units, though that project isn't expected to be completed until 2029 with leasing starting in 2030. Nearby, Union Channel at 240 Third Avenue, with 224 units, was completed in early 2025, while Douglass Port at 251 Douglass Street is planned for 260 units with a mid-2026 completion target. Further along, Nevins Landing North and South are slated to add 348 and 306 units, respectively, with leasing expected to begin in 2027.
A Debate Over Development and the Canal's Future
The pace of construction has stirred debate among neighbors about what Gowanus should become. Mark Gimein, described by the Post as a Gowanus resident, wrote that a New York Magazine article on the neighborhood embraced backwards logic about development and overblown environmental concerns, according to the Post's account of his comments in City Journal. The remark reflects an ongoing argument in the neighborhood over how aggressively to build along a waterway still associated with its industrial past, even as towers like Anagram push steadily toward completion.
