1271 Avenue of the Americas

"Time & Life Building" redirects here. For other uses, see Time-Life Building (disambiguation).
1271 Avenue of the Americas

1271 Avenue of the Americas
General information
Location 1271 Avenue of the Americas, New York City
Coordinates 40°45′37″N 73°58′51″W / 40.760372°N 73.980799°W / 40.760372; -73.980799Coordinates: 40°45′37″N 73°58′51″W / 40.760372°N 73.980799°W / 40.760372; -73.980799
Completed 1958
Owner Rockefeller Group
Management Rockefeller Group
Height
Top floor 587 ft (179 m)
Technical details
Floor count 48
Floor area 28,000 sq ft (2,600 m2)
Design and construction
Architect Wallace Harrison of Harrison, Abramovitz, and Harris
1271 Avenue of the Americas Sidewalk

1271 Avenue of the Americas is a 48-story office building located in Rockefeller Center in New York City. It opened in 1959 as the Time & Life Building, designed by architect Wallace Harrison, of Harrison, Abramovitz, and Harris.[1]

History

1271 Avenue of the Americas was the first of four in Rockefeller Center designed by Harrison, Abramovitz, & Harris on the west side of Sixth Avenue. Harris served as the building's project manager and was responsible for overall planning. The Time & Life Building was the first expansion of Rockefeller Center west of the Avenue of the Americas. Air rights were purchased from the Roxy Theatre to the west. The Roxy was torn down in 1960 to erect an office tower connected to the Time & Life Building.

The building is clad in green glass and features column-free floors of 28,000 square feet (2,600 m2). Large murals by Josef Albers and Fritz Glarner adorn its lobby, which integrates a serpentine patterned sidewalk design found on the sidewalks of Rio de Janeiro's Copacabana Beach with the adjacent sidewalk,[1] a salute to its location on The Avenue of the Americas.

Time Inc., the publisher of Time, Life, Sports Illustrated, Fortune, House & Home, and Architectural Forum magazines initially occupied 21 floors. CNN's American Morning was based there from 2002 to 2006. The ground floor studio is now occupied by the studio of SportsNet New York and CNBC Squawk Box.

In May 2014, Time Inc announced that the company was planning to leave the Time & Life Building for the Brookfield Place complex in lower Manhattan.[2]

The Hemisphere Club

The Hemisphere Club, a members-only restaurant during the day, was located atop the building on the 48th floor; in the evenings it opened to the public as the Tower Suite. The restaurant was operated by Restaurant Associates, which also operated The Four Seasons Restaurant, La Fonda del Sol, The Rainbow Room, The Forum of the Twelve Caesars, and later Windows on the World. The Hemisphere Club closed some time after 1991.[3]

La Fonda del Sol

La Fonda del Sol was a Latin American–themed restaurant opened in the Time & Life Building's lobby by Joseph Baum in 1960.[4] It featured bright, colorful, whimsical interiors designed by Alexander Girard and furniture by Charles Eames. It closed in 1971 and was replaced with a Fidelity Investments branch.[5]

Time-Life Chairs

In addition to furniture for the La Fonda del Sol restaurant, Charles Eames designed iconic chairs for the offices of Time Incorporated which have become known as Time-Life Chairs.[6] Eames designed them as a favor to Henry Luce, who had allowed Eames to use photos from the Time-Life archives for the pavilion he designed at the 1959 American National Exhibition in Moscow.[7] The chairs remain in production and popular to this day, manufactured by Herman Miller of Zeeland, MI, though the original design with four legs at the base has been revised to include a fifth leg, referred to as a 5 star-base, for stability and to meet updated codes.[8]

In fiction

Tenants

References

Inline citations

  1. 1 2 "TIME & LIFE BUILDING : Landmarks Preservation Commission" (PDF). Nyc.gov. Retrieved 2016-10-17.
  2. ↑ "Time Inc. to Move to Lower Manhattan's Brookfield Place". Bloomberg.com. 2014-05-22. Retrieved 2016-10-17.
  3. ↑ Danovich, Tove (2012-04-30). "The Hemisphere Club / Tower Suite on Mad Men". Eater.com. Retrieved 2016-10-17.
  4. ↑ "Latin-American Zest on Midtown Menu," New York Times, December 9, 1960
  5. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2015-04-03. Retrieved 2016-03-22.
  6. ↑ "Eames Executive - Executive Chair". Herman Miller. Retrieved 2016-10-17.
  7. ↑ "Eames Executive Chair - Design Within Reach". Dwr.com. Retrieved 2016-10-17.
  8. ↑ "Eames Executive Chair - Executive Chairs - Chairs - Herman Miller Official Store". Store.hermanmiller.com. Retrieved 2016-10-17.
  9. ↑ Renner, Eric (2015-03-23). "AMC unveils 'The Draper Bench' outside New York's Time-Life Building". EW.com. Retrieved 2016-10-17.
  10. ↑ "Newmark Knight Frank team leasing 230,000 s/f at Time Life | Real Estate Weekly". Rew-online.com. Retrieved 2016-10-17.
  11. ↑ "SANDOW Home Page". Sandow.com. Retrieved 2016-10-17.
  12. ↑ "Hampton Canyon". Hampton Canyon. Retrieved 2016-10-17.

General references

External links

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