Design

A Cozy Cabin Pops Up to Replace New York's Steaming Manholes

Artist Mark Reigelman II says he will install the wee house throughout the year, “assuming I don’t get arrested or the cabin confiscated.”
Mark Reigelman II

Anyone who’s lived in New York has seen those orange-and-white tubes stuck like big straws into the street, drawing up steam from somewhere in the city’s boiling underbelly. While they’re staples of the landscape, their hunting-vest colors and utilitarian design leave out much in the beauty department—is there any way to give them a makeover?