“It’s about a seven-minute process…if we don’t stop”

“Stop! Stop! No one touch anything!” the voice rang out from a worker’s walkie. This was but a few minutes into the “nesting” of The Shed’s outer shell, turning the enclosed performance space into an outdoor plaza (dubbed the McCourt) in preparation for the institution’s summer event series. A crew of hard-hatted supervisors stalked each of the 6′-diameter steel wheels as workmen emptied cans of lubricant onto the slow-spinning discs. Before the crowd knew it, the lurching building had resumed its crawl.

While only supposed to take around seven minutes—according to a live-streaming staff member I can only assume was the social media manager—two stoppages stretched the slow roll to nineteen, not including the previous four hours it took workers to “disconnect” the McCourt from the rest of the building. When the live-streaming staffer learned that, unlike the majority tourist crowd, I had come to Hudson Yards that morning specifically to see this feat of architectural action, he asked if it lived up to my expectations. “Well, it moved,” I responded.