For Architects & Interior Designers
Luxury Aquarium
Design NYC
You bring the vision. We engineer, fabricate, install, and maintain.
Okeanos Group has built custom aquariums for New York architects and interior designers since 2002. Our work has appeared in Architectural Digest, Dwell, Elle Decor, and Departures — always as the technical partner to the lead design firm, never as the face of the project.
If you are scoping a residential, commercial, or hospitality project with a significant aquarium element, we are the firm that architects and interior designers call when the aquarium has to be as resolved as the rest of the space. We fit into your process rather than asking you to adapt to ours.
Working With Design Firms
Trade collaboration is the core of our practice. Most residential and commercial aquarium projects that meet the Okeanos threshold come to us through an architect or interior designer who has already scoped the space. The sooner we are in the room, the cleaner the final execution.
Our preferred engagement starts in schematic design. At that phase, we review the proposed aquarium volume against load, viewing angles, millwork reveals, mechanical access, and the building's existing systems. We return a written engineering note covering tank dimensions, total filled weight, filtration volume, electrical load, plumbing runs, and the square footage required for a concealed mechanical closet. This note becomes part of your design development set.
At construction documents, we deliver cabinet shop drawings, cut sheets for glass or acrylic, plumbing and electrical schematics, and any framing or structural callouts your engineer needs. Our package is formatted to drop directly into an AIA-style spec section — we maintain templates for 06 40 00 (Architectural Woodwork) and 13 49 00 (Integrated Aquarium Systems).
The most common failure mode we see: the aquarium is introduced after CDs are issued. At that point, the sub-floor is rated for the wrong load, the chase for plumbing was never framed, the mechanical closet has no drain, and the electrical panel is undersized. Luxury aquarium design NYC projects that are pulled in late almost always come back smaller or less integrated than the designer originally intended.
Design firms we have worked with repeatedly treat the aquarium as another architectural system — parallel to millwork, lighting, and AV — rather than as a decorative add. When we are consulted at the right moment, the tank ends up as integrated as a staircase or a fireplace: part of the architecture, not set on top of it.
Architectural Integration
Five integration scenarios we deliver routinely:
Peninsula and room-divider aquariums
Two-sided viewing changes the engineering. The cabinet has no back, so the life-support system lives in a remote mechanical closet connected by concealed plumbing runs. Load is distributed differently than a wall-backed tank, and the structural engineer needs our filled-weight spec early. We deliver framing callouts showing exactly where the load concentrates.
Through-wall and window aquariums
A tank that reads from two rooms requires a waterproofed framing detail, a removable access panel on one face, and a concealed plumbing chase between the tank and the mechanical room. We coordinate with your framer and MEP on the chase location during DD, not during rough-in.
Cylindrical and freestanding sculptures
A column-format aquarium can substitute for a structural column if engineered with a steel sleeve and plinth detail. We work with your structural engineer on the sleeve spec. Round and elliptical tanks are cell-cast acrylic — the material choice is driven by geometry and viewing distance.
Water-feature hybrids
Skylit water walls, reflective pools, and aquarium-to-water-feature transitions live in a category of their own. See our Skylight Water Feature project for a built example of a luxury aquarium design NYC water feature integrated into an interior architecture program.
Concealed-equipment installations
For every project at this tier, all life-support systems — skimmers, calcium reactors, ozone, UV, auto-top-off, CO2, return pumps, controllers — live in an adjacent mechanical room. The display side shows glass, water, livestock, and cabinetry. Nothing else. No visible plumbing, no equipment noise in occupied space, no heat rejection into the room.
Materials & Craftsmanship
Low-Iron Starphire Glass
Cleanest optical transmission — no green edge tint. Default for flat-panel and standard-geometry aquariums up to roughly 120 inches long. Scratches less than acrylic and holds clarity indefinitely.
Cell-Cast Acrylic
Correct specification for curved geometry, thick-walled tanks above 24 inches of water depth, and upper-floor installations where the structural engineer has flagged load. Enables shapes glass cannot.
Cabinetry
Fully custom to match your millwork palette. Rift-sawn white oak, walnut veneer, stone-veneer panels, full-lacquer finishes — the cabinet is treated as architectural millwork.
Integrated lighting
Full-spectrum LED. For reef installations: Kessil and Radion fixtures concealed in a valance or ceiling-recessed pocket. For architectural aquariums: concealed linear LED with tunable color temperature dialed to the room’s other fixtures.
Equipment
Industrial-grade throughout: ATB skimmers, Royal Exclusiv pumps, Reef Octopus components, Neptune Apex for system control and remote monitoring. Every serviceable component is accessed from behind the display or from the mechanical room.
Closeout binder
Glass or acrylic specs, cabinet finish schedules, lighting cut sheets, full equipment inventory with model numbers and serial numbers, warranty documents, and initial water-chemistry baseline — delivered to your firm and the owner at substantial completion.
Featured Design Collaborations
Twenty-plus years of luxury aquarium design NYC delivery. Each project was led by an architect or interior designer.
Pierre Huyghe Aquarium
Fabrication and installation for a work by the contemporary artist. The scope required biological and optical parameters specified by the artist's studio, a custom geometry that did not exist as a stock tank, and installation inside an active exhibition space.
Skylight Water Feature
Interior water piece integrated into a skylit architectural program. Coordinated with the architect during schematic design to resolve waterproofing, drainage, and mechanical access in a space with no obvious place to put a pump room.
Residential Lobby
Entrance statement piece for a residential building. Large-format aquarium with a reveal detail at the cabinet-to-wall junction that allowed the tank to appear to float within the millwork program.
Corporate Reef Installation
Feature wall reef aquarium for a Manhattan office. The mechanical room is two walls away; the display side shows only livestock and water.
The Stable Home, Hamptons
Collaboration with the residential architect on a built-in aquarium that resolved into the main living space millwork. Glass selection and cabinet coordination matched the adjacent casework.
Loft Aquarium
Downtown loft integration. Cabinet detailing matched the steel fabrication already on site — exposed brick, blackened steel, reclaimed oak.
Published in Architectural Digest, Dwell, Elle Decor, and Departures.
Trade Program
For active architects and interior designers working on luxury aquarium design NYC projects:
- Preferred-partner scheduling — trade consultations booked ahead of consumer inquiries, most within three business days.
- Net-30 billing for qualified trade accounts. No prepayment required for design phases.
- Standard AIA-format spec packages: Sections 06 40 00 and 13 49 00 delivered to your specifier in editable format.
- Site-survey turnaround within five business days in NYC with a written site note delivered within a week.
- Dedicated senior designer per project — one point of contact from schematic through post-occupancy.
- Co-branded walkthrough videos for completed installations, delivered in web and social formats.
- Press coordination for Architectural Digest, Dwell, Elle Decor, Departures, and comparable publications — technical photography and captions that credit your firm as the lead.
Project Timeline
How Okeanos fits a standard design-firm construction schedule:
Schematic design
We join the first meeting where the aquarium appears on the program. We deliver a volume, load, and mechanical spec note within two weeks — real numbers your structural engineer, MEP, and millworker can plan around.
Design development
Finalized aquarium renderings at your specified viewing angle, cut sheets for glass or acrylic, cabinet drawings coordinated with your millwork consultant, and a cost range based on the resolved scope.
Construction documents
Our drawings fold into your CD set: framing callouts, plumbing chase locations, electrical loads on the panel schedule, mechanical-room requirements, waterproofing details. AIA-format spec sections delivered to your specifier.
Construction
Aquarium fabrication runs in parallel with site work. We show up for site verification once the sub-floor, framing, and MEP rough are complete. Fabrication lead time is typically six to twelve weeks.
Installation
White-glove delivery, rigging, set, plumbing tie-in, electrical tie-in, leak test, cycling. Owner walk-through is conducted jointly with your team.
Post-occupancy
Weekly or bi-weekly maintenance by the same in-house service team that commissioned the installation. Continuity from install through ongoing care.
Investment
Luxury aquarium design NYC projects led by design firms typically sit in the $150,000 to $500,000 range for residential installations. Signature commercial installations run higher. Large-format architectural aquariums that anchor a lobby, gallery, or primary living room can exceed $1M all-in when the scope includes significant structural work, custom millwork, and a full mechanical room build-out.
Every project is scoped after a site survey and trade project brief review. We do not provide pricing without seeing plans. A rough-order-of-magnitude estimate based on a written scope and a set of drawings is typically returned within ten business days and is no-fee.
For more detail on how cost breaks down across scope elements, see Custom Home Aquarium Cost. Budget ranges for luxury aquarium design NYC work are driven primarily by viewing-surface size, cabinetry complexity, mechanical-room scope, and livestock program.
Next Step for Design Firms
If you have a live project with an aquarium component, email us your plans. We will return a preliminary design and engineering note within ten business days. No fee for the initial review. We treat every trade inquiry as a serious luxury aquarium design NYC engagement and respond in writing, not with a generic intake form.
Send Us Your Plans212-244-9555 · [email protected]
521 West 26th Street #600, New York, NY 10001