“Vessel” is the name of the Thomas Heatherwick-designed structure at the Hudson Yards on the West Side of Manhattan, opened on March 15, 2019. The honeycomb-like structure has 154 flights of stairs.
 
New Yorkers immediately noticed that the structure resembled a giant shawarma.
 
“Hudson Yards $200M Art Piece Looks Like a Giant Shawarma; Incidentally, the development has no restaurant dedicated to shawarma” by Carolyn Alburger was printed on the website Eater—New York on March 15, 2019. “The Vessel’s hornet’s nest logo is on everything, but nowhere does its silhouette most excite me than when it accidentally appears on the side of a nearby food truck—The Giant Shawarma mirrored by an actual shawarma” was printed on the blog Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York on March 18, 2019.  “The $150 million climbable sculpture ‘The Vessel’ has been re-christened ‘The Shawarma’ by locals because of its shape and brown color” was printed in the New York (NY) Post‘s Page Six on March 18, 2019.
 
Another nickname for the Vessel is the “Stairway to Nowhere.”
   
 
Wikipedia: Vessel (structure)
Vessel (alternately called Hudson Yards Staircase) is a public structure and landmark that was built as part of the Hudson Yards Redevelopment Project in Manhattan, New York City. The concept for Vessel was revealed in 2016. Construction started in April 2017. The structure topped out in December 2017 and opened on March 15, 2019.
 
The elaborate honeycomb-like structure rises 16 stories and consists of 154 flights of stairs, 2,500 steps, and 80 landings that visitors would be able to climb. Designed by the British designer Thomas Heatherwick, Vessel is the main feature of the 5-acre (2.0 ha) Hudson Yards Public Square. It is expected to have a final cost of $200 million.
     
Wikipedia: Shawarma
Shawarma (/ʃəˈwɑːrmə/; Arabic: شاورما‎), also shaurma and other spellings, is a Middle Eastern meat preparation based on the döner kebab of Ottoman Turkey. Originally made of lamb or mutton, today’s shawarma may also be chicken, turkey, beef, or veal, cut in thin slices and stacked in a cone-like shape on a vertical rotisserie. Thin slices are shaved off the cooked surface as it continuously rotates. Shawarma is one of the world’s most popular street foods, especially in Egypt and the countries of the Levant and the Arabian Peninsula.
 
Hudson Yards—New York
VESSEL (TKA)
Public Square and Gardens
Mon-Sun: 10:00am-9:00pm
The extraordinary centerpiece of Hudson Yards is its spiral staircase, a soaring new landmark meant to be climbed. This interactive design piece was imagined by Thomas Heatherwick and Heatherwick Studio as a focal point where people can enjoy new perspectives of the city and one another from different heights, angles and vantage points.
 
Comprised of 154 intricately interconnecting flights of stairs—almost 2,500 individual steps and 80 landings—with nearly one mile of vertical climb above the Public Square and Gardens, this landmark will offer remarkable views.
 
Eater—New York
Hudson Yards $200M Art Piece Looks Like a Giant Shawarma
Incidentally, the development has no restaurant dedicated to shawarma
by Carolyn Alburger@CarolynAlburger Mar 15, 2019, 11:05am EDT
Today, Manhattan’s new $25 billion development, Hudson Yards, will pull the veil back from its $200 million central art piece, a collection of 2,500 Italian-made bronze- and steel-encased steps. The New York Times declared it the city’s biggest Rorschach test. It’s been likened to a monstrous beehive or M.C. Escher’s impossible staircase, and its famous creator, Thomas Heatherwick, has even touted its utility as an adult jungle gym for New York’s fanatical fitness types.
 
But for the food people flocking to the space today, it might look like something else: a colossal shawarma — New York’s first mile-high bronze-and-steel meat on a spit.
         
Twitter
David J. Katz
@davidjkatz
@_HudsonYardsNYC $200M Art Piece, Named “The Vessel” Looks Like a Giant Shawarma. Incidentally, the development has no restaurant dedicated to shawarma. #architecture @NYC
12:10 PM - 15 Mar 2019
       
Twitter 
Eyewitness News
@ABC7NY
DO YOU SEE IT? Hudson Yards’ new 150-foot-tall Vessel sculpture sort of looks like shawarma, at least according to Eater NY’s @CarolynAlburger. How appropriately New York! https://7ny.tv/2XWEiQG
(A comparison is shown.—ed.)
12:30 PM - 15 Mar 2019
     
Twitter
•••
@edisoncummings_
we gotta rename the Hudson yards vessel to the giant shawarma
5:16 PM - 16 Mar 2019
 
Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York
MONDAY, MARCH 18, 2019
Visiting Hudson Yards
For its opening weekend, Hudson Yards, aka Dubai on the Hudson, is crammed with people. They walk the glistening floors of the luxury shopping mall and climb The Vessel, aka The Giant Shawarma (h/t Eater).
(...)
The Vessel’s hornet’s nest logo is on everything, but nowhere does its silhouette most excite me than when it accidentally appears on the side of a nearby food truck—The Giant Shawarma mirrored by an actual shawarma.
 
As I escape Hudson Yards, I point out the similarity to the vendor inside the truck. “Yes,” he calls out, seeing the joke, “the same! It is the same!” And he has a good laugh. In the end, it all seems like one big joke.
 
New York (NY) Post—Page Six
New Hudson Yards climbable art sculpture compared to street meat
By Page Six Team March 18, 2019 | 10:08am
(...)
The $150 million climbable sculpture “The Vessel” has been re-christened “The Shawarma” by locals because of its shape and brown color. While it may not “meat” the standards of NYC’s art crowd it’s a hit with shawarma vendors.
 
Author Jeremiah Moss tweeted that a street-meat guy near the 15-story structure saw the resemblance and raved, “Same, yes! Same!”
 
Twitter
Thomas Hynes
@ThomasHynes
Like every other New Yorker, I have ventured to our newly beloved vessel, aka the beehive, aka the golden shawarma, a perfectly lovely, albeit pointless monument that is truly worthy of its home.
2:58 PM - 19 Mar 2019
 
Slate
The Meat Stick on 34th Street
Why the Shawarma is the perfect name for the architectural centerpiece of New York’s glitzy Hudson Yards.
By HENRY GRABAR
MARCH 19, 2019 3:51 PM