One Worldwide Plaza
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One Worldwide Plaza is the largest tower of Worldwide Plaza, a three-building commercial and residential complex in the
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neighborhood of
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in
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. Designed by
David Childs David Magie Childs (born April 1, 1941) is an American architect and chairman emeritus of the architectural firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. He is the architect of the new One World Trade Center in New York City. Early life and education Chil ...
of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), One Worldwide Plaza measures tall and has an alternative address of 825 Eighth Avenue. The tower is the easternmost building in the complex, which occupies the entire city block bounded by Eighth Avenue, Ninth Avenue, 49th Street, and 50th Street and is built on the site of New York City's third Madison Square Garden. Adjacent to One Worldwide Plaza to the west are a public plaza and two residential buildings. The classically inspired building contains a three-story granite base, a brick midsection with setbacks, and a pyramidal copper roof with a glass lantern. Inside, there are storefronts and entrances to the New York City Subway's 50th Street station, while three double-height lobbies lead to different sets of office floors. Worldwide Plaza was developed in the late 1980s by a syndicate led by William Zeckendorf Jr. Upon opening, One Worldwide Plaza was nearly fully occupied, with two anchor tenants: advertising agency
Ogilvy & Mather Ogilvy is a New York City-based British advertising, marketing, and public relations agency. It was founded in 1850 by Edmund Mather as a London-based advertising agency, agency. In 1964, the firm became known as Ogilvy & Mather after merging wit ...
and law firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore. During the mid-1990s, the office space was leased at a very low price. The
Blackstone Group Blackstone Inc. is an American alternative investment management company based in New York City. Blackstone's private equity business has been one of the largest investors in leveraged buyouts in the last three decades, while its real estate bu ...
acquired the complex in 1996 and sold it to
Equity Office Properties EQ Office is a real estate investment company that owns 80 office properties comprising 40 million square feet. The company is owned by funds managed by The Blackstone Group. The company was formerly known as Equity Office. History The company w ...
in 1998. When Blackstone took over Equity Office in 2007, it sold the office building to
Harry Macklowe Harry B. Macklowe (born 1937) is an American real estate developer and investor based in New York City. Early life Macklowe was born to a Jewish family, the son of a garment executive from Westchester County, New York. He graduated from New Ro ...
, who lost the building to foreclosure. George Comfort and Sons took over One Worldwide Plaza in 2009. American Realty Capital New York bought a controlling stake in 2017, selling off a non-controlling stake to RXR Realty and
SL Green Realty SL Green Realty Corp. is a real estate investment trust that primarily invests in office buildings and shopping centers in New York City. As of December 31, 2019, the company owned 43 properties comprising 14,438,964 square feet. Notable proper ...
.


Site

Worldwide Plaza was developed in the late 1980s by a syndicate led by William Zeckendorf Jr. One Worldwide Plaza, the easternmost structure in the complex, was designed by
David Childs David Magie Childs (born April 1, 1941) is an American architect and chairman emeritus of the architectural firm Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. He is the architect of the new One World Trade Center in New York City. Early life and education Chil ...
of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM). To the west are two residential buildings, Two and Three Worldwide Plaza, designed by Frank Williams; they are respectively composed of a 39-story tower and a series of five- and six-story-tall townhouses. In addition, the complex contains of retail space, as well as theaters and a garage. According to Zeckendorf, Worldwide Plaza was intended to be "a self-contained community and also a destination point for other people in the city". The Worldwide Plaza complex is built on the site of New York City's third Madison Square Garden (MSG). Following the opening of the current Madison Square Garden arena at 34th Street, the former arena was closed in 1968 and demolished. By the 1980s, the surrounding area consisted mostly of lower-income tenements and small retail buildings, and ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
'' described the area as "a neighborhood best known for pornography and cheap bars".


Architecture

One Worldwide Plaza is a 50-story office skyscraper measuring high, with a pyramidal roof at its top. Several architectural details of One Worldwide Plaza were inspired by early-1930s classical designs, specifically the
Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...
style. The building is divided horizontally into three sections: a base, shaft, and capital. The materials used in its construction were sourced from a variety of locations. The brick was manufactured by Glen-Gery at a factory in Pennsylvania, while the windows were made in Wisconsin. By contrast, the roofing and precast concrete were made in Canada, the structural steel was bought in Luxembourg, and the project used Brazilian granite and Italian marble. HRH Construction was the building's general construction contractor. Including the residential buildings, the complex was to cover , more than the maximum size allowed without
zoning Zoning is a method of urban planning in which a municipality or other tier of government divides land into areas called zones, each of which has a set of regulations for new development that differs from other zones. Zones may be defined for a si ...
bonuses. Under normal zoning regulations, the maximum
floor area ratio Floor area ratio (FAR) is the ratio of a building's total floor area (gross floor area) to the size of the piece of land upon which it is built. It is often used as one of the regulations in city planning along with the building-to-land ratio. The ...
(FAR) for any building on Worldwide Plaza's site was 10, but the developers received two bonuses of 2 FAR each, bringing the FAR to 14. The developers added a midblock plaza for the first bonus and renovated the adjacent 50th Street station for the second bonus.


Facade

The base of the building is three stories tall and is designed to relate to the neighboring residential buildings. It is clad with gray-purple
granite Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies under ...
and contains outwardly curved entrances on all four sides. These curved sections contain Renaissance-inspired
colonnade In classical architecture, a colonnade is a long sequence of columns joined by their entablature, often free-standing, or part of a building. Paired or multiple pairs of columns are normally employed in a colonnade which can be straight or cur ...
s with granite
pilaster In classical architecture, a pilaster is an architectural element used to give the appearance of a supporting column and to articulate an extent of wall, with only an ornamental function. It consists of a flat surface raised from the main wal ...
s, behind which is an oval passageway with a vaulted ceiling. The building's two original anchor tenants, advertising agency
Ogilvy & Mather Ogilvy is a New York City-based British advertising, marketing, and public relations agency. It was founded in 1850 by Edmund Mather as a London-based advertising agency, agency. In 1964, the firm became known as Ogilvy & Mather after merging wit ...
and law firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore, had their own entrances. This was because Ogilvy & Mather had requested a private entrance during the building's construction. Ogilvy & Mather's entrance faced 49th Street; Cravath, Swaine & Moore's entrance faced Eighth Avenue; and other tenants had an entrance facing west. The entrance on the northern elevation, facing 50th Street, is used for retail rather than as an office lobby. The rest of the facade is made largely of brick and is designed in a manner reminiscent of the Gothic Revival style. Glen-Gery was hired to manufacture the brick because it was one of the few contractors capable of manufacturing the tinted brick that the developers wanted. The main section of the building is clad with
maize Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. The ...
-colored brick, but the windows at the center of each elevation are emphasized by vertical strips of rust-colored brick. The facade originally contained single-paned windows, which gave the effect of a flat facade. The building contains several setbacks, which are decorated with white brick that is designed to evoke the appearance of stone. The building has shallow setbacks, which make it much larger than older Art Deco skyscrapers in New York City. The tower is topped by a pyramidal copper roof with round dormer windows. The pyramid has eight sides and measures tall. The design of the roof was inspired by the pyramidal roofs of several other New York City office buildings in the early 20th century, such as the New York Life Building and the
Helmsley Building The Helmsley Building is a 35-story skyscraper at 230 Park Avenue between East 45th and 46th Streets in New York City, just north of Grand Central Terminal, in Midtown Manhattan. It was built in 1929 as the New York Central Building and was d ...
. The building is crowned by a pyramidal glass lantern.


Interior

Childs constructed three lobbies at One Worldwide Plaza, each with a separate entrance. Each lobby was originally decorated with Fiore di Pesco marble. There are storefronts along the ground-level colonnade adjacent to the three lobbies, as well as on both levels of each lobby. In addition, there are restrooms along the western side of the arcade. The two-story-high lobby on Eighth Avenue was used by Cravath, Swaine & Moore, which installed security checkpoints on both levels of the lobby, reducing the amount of retail space there. On each side, visitors had to take an escalator from ground level to the upper lobby, where they could access the elevators. Each lobby had access to a bank of elevators. There are four elevator banks in total, comprising 22 passenger elevators and two truck elevators. The building's base also contained a day-care center sponsored by Cravath, Swaine & Moore for its employees' children. Northwest of the lobbies is a truck elevator on 50th Street. The building contains a steel superstructure weighing . Each floor slab is made of concrete, which is poured onto a metal deck. The floor slabs measure . The maximum
structural load A structural load or structural action is a force, deformation, or acceleration applied to structural elements. A load causes stress, deformation, and displacement in a structure. Structural analysis, a discipline in engineering, analyzes the ...
on each column was on average. These loads were carried down into the concrete
spread footing A shallow foundation is a type of building Foundation (engineering), foundation that transfers structural load to the earth very near to the surface, rather than to a subsurface layer or a range of depths, as does a deep foundation. Customarily, a ...
s at the building's
foundation Foundation may refer to: * Foundation (nonprofit), a type of charitable organization ** Foundation (United States law), a type of charitable organization in the U.S. ** Private foundation, a charitable organization that, while serving a good cause ...
. The superstructure was stiffened by moment frames at the building's perimeter, which were braced to the elevator core.
Concrete masonry unit A concrete masonry unit (CMU) is a standard-size rectangular block used in building construction. CMUs are some of the most versatile building products available because of the wide variety of appearances that can be achieved using them. Th ...
s were then installed around the outermost beams of the superstructure, providing waterproofing. One Worldwide Plaza contains of office space. The upper stories each have of rentable space. Each story has an
open plan Open plan is the generic term used in architectural and interior design for any floor plan that makes use of large, open spaces and minimizes the use of small, enclosed rooms such as private offices. The term can also refer to landscaping of h ...
, and the slab-to-slab height of each story is . The restrooms, staircases, and elevators are clustered near the building's core. The banks of elevators taper off at higher levels. For example, the 21st and 28th stories have space for three banks of elevators, although only two elevator banks serve these levels. Cravath, Swaine & Moore originally occupied the 38th to 49th stories. ''The New York Times'' described the offices as using of marble and of mahogany.


Other features


Public plaza

A mid-block public plaza separates One Worldwide Plaza from Two and Three Worldwide Plaza. The New York City Department of City Planning (DCP) had approved the construction and maintenance of the public plaza in exchange for additional floors in the office tower. The plaza originally covered , but its owner reduced the plaza's size by 10 percent in 2002 as part of a lawsuit settlement. During the summer, the plaza hosts the Worldwide Plaza Summer Concert Series. Jerold S. Kayden wrote of the buildings' plaza: "Its half-acre size, numerous movable chairs, comfortable ledge seating, food service at north and south ends, decorative water fountain, and landscaping of trees and shrubs render it highly functional for the diverse audience." The landscaping of the plaza contains over 40 trees and numerous plantings, and a cafe. Public seating is available year round. The center of the plaza is highlighted by a fountain created by Sidney Simon called "The Four Seasons". Four bronze statues of standing nude women, each representing a season, hold up a globe. Below the globe are four fountains, each carved in the shape of a man's head.


Amenities

The complex also has a health club measuring . The health club was originally operated by Bally Health and Tennis. Beneath the plaza is a 450-spot parking garage with 450 or 473 parking spaces. Beneath the public plaza, there was originally a multiplex cinema with six screens, operated by the
Cineplex Odeon Corporation Cineplex Odeon Corporation was one of North America's largest movie theatre operators and live theatre, with theatres in its home country of Canada and the United States. The Cineplex Odeon brand is still being used by Cineplex Entertainment at ...
. The multiplex's lobby was just below ground level, while the auditoriums themselves were in the second basement level. The cinema operated until 2001 and was converted into
New World Stages New World Stages is a five-theater, Off-Broadway performing arts complex in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It is between 49th and 50th Streets beneath the plaza of the Worldwide Plaza complex at Eighth Avenue. ...
, a complex of five Off-Broadway theaters, in 2004. The multiplex was completely reconstructed as part of that project. The modern theatrical complex contains a double-level lobby, accessed by escalators from 50th Street.


Subway entrance

One Worldwide Plaza's basement contains two entrances to the southbound platform of the 50th Street station of the New York City Subway, served by the . There is an elevator entrance on 49th Street and an escalator entrance on 50th Street. The entrances were built in exchange for of additional space. They contain a mezzanine, escalators, elevators, and stairs. The Zeckendorfs also commissioned artist
Matt Mullican Matt Mullican (born September 18, 1951) is an American artist and educator. He is the child of artists Lee Mullican and Luchita Hurtado. Mullican lives and works in both Berlin and New York City. Early life and education Matt Mullican was b ...
to create an etched-granite mural for the station, which cost $150,000. The mural, measuring tall, contains black
relief Relief is a sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces are bonded to a solid background of the same material. The term '' relief'' is from the Latin verb ''relevo'', to raise. To create a sculpture in relief is to give the impression that th ...
panels depicting the site's history. A closed stairway on 49th Street was also refurbished as part of the project.


History


Early proposals

After the third Madison Square Garden was demolished in 1968, the site was operated as a parking lot for nearly two decades. Several proposals for redeveloping the site had all failed due to a lack of funding. In 1966, a "Cinema City" with two office towers, two Broadway theaters, four movie theaters, and several film and recording studios was proposed for the site. Three years later,
New York City Center New York City Center (previously known as the Mecca Temple, City Center of Music and Drama,. The name "City Center for Music and Drama Inc." is the organizational parent of the New York City Ballet and, until 2011, the New York City Opera. and t ...
proposed developing a four-theater complex, a film production center, and a new home for the American Film Institute on the site. In 1973,
Cushman & Wakefield Cushman & Wakefield plc is a global commercial real estate services firm. The company's corporate headquarters is located in Chicago, Illinois. Cushman & Wakefield is among the world's largest commercial real estate services firms, with revenues ...
and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill were hired to study the feasibility of constructing a large commercial showroom complex on the site similar to the
Merchandise Mart The Merchandise Mart (or the Merch Mart, or the Mart) is a commercial building located in downtown Chicago, Illinois. When it was opened in 1930, it was the largest building in the world, with of floor space. The Art Deco structure is locate ...
in
Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...
or
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in
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. The complex would be topped by a tower. In December 1976, developers Frank Stanton and Victor Elmaleh of the World‐Wide Group proposed Hippodrome Park, an indoor amusement park that would cost $30 million. The name was a homage to the former New York Hippodrome. The amusement park would have been designed by Randall Duell and would have included a variety of rides, restaurants, and films. The structure would have been enclosed in glass, which would have allowed the park to operate year-round; it would also have contained a 500-seat parking lot in the basement. The City of New York was supportive of the project as part of its initiative to clean up nearby
Times Square Times Square is a major commercial intersection, tourist destination, entertainment hub, and neighborhood in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. It is formed by the junction of Broadway, Seventh Avenue, and 42nd Street. Together with adjacent ...
. Ultimately, the developers chose not to spend $12 million on an option for the site. Conglomerate
Gulf and Western Industries Gulf and Western Industries, Inc. (stylized as Gulf+Western) was an American conglomerate. Originally, the company focused on manufacturing and resource extraction. Beginning in 1966, and continuing throughout the 1960s and 1970s, the company ...
acquired control of the site in 1977 as part of its acquisition of the Madison Square Garden Corporation. The company devised plans in 1980 for a mixed-use project on the site, including an office building on Eighth Avenue and apartments on Ninth Avenue, both designed by SOM. Its proposal called for a three-story retail podium supporting a 52-story office building and two 60-story apartment towers; the development would have contained a combined . Gulf and Western operated the site as a parking lot in the meantime. The company had decided to sell the site by 1984, as its long term strategy did not include the redevelopment of the old Madison Square Garden.


Development

Gulf and Western sold the site to a group led by William Zeckendorf Jr. in December 1984 for $100 million. His partners in the project included
Arthur G. Cohen Arthur George Cohen (April 23, 1930 – August 9, 2014) was an American businessman and real estate developer in New York City. Early life and education Cohen was born to a Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York, the son of Frances (née Kostic ...
, an independent real-estate investor; Victor Elmaleh and Frank Stanton, the principals of the World Wide Realty Corporation; and KG Land New York Corporation, a subsidiary of Japanese company
Kumagai Gumi is a Japanese construction company founded in Fukui, Fukui Prefecture, Japan. The company still has registered headquarters in Fukui, but the actual head office is located in Shinjuku, Tokyo. History Santaro Kumagai, the company's founder, beg ...
. The group had to raise a $12.5 million
letter of credit A letter of credit (LC), also known as a documentary credit or bankers commercial credit, or letter of undertaking (LoU), is a payment mechanism used in international trade to provide an economic guarantee from a creditworthy bank to an ex ...
and finalize their sale within 18 months. Zeckendorf and his partners announced in January 1985 that they had selected SOM to design the new complex. Zeckendorf hoped that the development would improve the character of Hell's Kitchen and Eighth Avenue, similar to how the construction of Axa Equitable Center four blocks northeast was intended to improve Seventh Avenue. It was one of several development projects planned within Hell's Kitchen, which at the time was characterized by physical decay and high crime. Zeckendorf said of Hell's Kitchen: "Ten years from now people will look back and marvel at how bad this neighborhood was."


Planning

SOM began designing the project in early 1985. The advertising agency
Ogilvy & Mather Ogilvy is a New York City-based British advertising, marketing, and public relations agency. It was founded in 1850 by Edmund Mather as a London-based advertising agency, agency. In 1964, the firm became known as Ogilvy & Mather after merging wit ...
, which was negotiating to lease a large amount of space in the building, was involved in the design. Zeckendorf's syndicate announced in November 1985 that it would erect a mixed-use complex on the MSG site, costing $500 million. The complex would include a 45-story office building on Eighth Avenue, as well as a 38-story condominium tower and several 6- and 7-story residential buildings to the west. There would also be six underground movie theaters, a health club, and a 450-space parking garage. Ogilvy would occupy in the office building. Ogilvy provided additional funds for the complex's construction in exchange for a 17 percent equity stake and some of One Worldwide Plaza's income. In addition, the complex would receive an eight-year, $60 million tax abatement. The developers obtained two zoning bonuses for the site by adding a midblock plaza and renovating the 50th Street station. Members of the local Manhattan Community Board 4 opposed Zeckendorf's project, citing the buildings' height and the lack of low- and moderate-income housing. Community members also raised concerns that the development would cause
gentrification Gentrification is the process of changing the character of a neighborhood through the influx of more affluent residents and businesses. It is a common and controversial topic in urban politics and planning. Gentrification often increases the ec ...
by pushing out lower-income tenants and family businesses. Some residents protested the project by requesting that Ogilvy & Mather withdraw from the project. Zeckendorf Company officials began negotiating with community board members "the day after" the board announced its opposition, and Zeckendorf announced in early 1986 that he would add
affordable housing Affordable housing is housing which is deemed affordable to those with a household income at or below the median as rated by the national government or a local government by a recognized housing affordability index. Most of the literature on af ...
to the neighborhood. He proposed renovating 132 apartments in other parts of the neighborhood, rather than adding these apartments to his new development. Zeckendorf made six other modifications to the project to improve neighborhood residents' quality of life, including storefronts for local merchants, a day-care center, and job training. In July 1986, the
New York City Board of Estimate The New York City Board of Estimate was a governmental body in New York City responsible for numerous areas of municipal policy and decisions, including the city budget, land-use, contracts, franchises, and water rates. Under the amendments effec ...
approved Zeckendorf's development. Manhattan borough president
David Dinkins David Norman Dinkins (July 10, 1927 – November 23, 2020) was an American politician, lawyer, and author who served as the 106th mayor of New York City from 1990 to 1993. He was the first African American to hold the office. Before enteri ...
, a supporter of the project, said the developers could not sell 60 of the complex's luxury units until all of the affordable units had been sold. The developers had to acquire another 70 affordable units to provide enough affordable housing for the complex. They ultimately fulfilled this requirement by acquiring six buildings on the block to the south. That October, Gulf and Western finalized its sale of the site to the joint venture of Zeckendorf, Cohen, KG Land, and Worldwide Holdings Corp. Zeckendorf also leased the theatrical complex to the
Cineplex Odeon Corporation Cineplex Odeon Corporation was one of North America's largest movie theatre operators and live theatre, with theatres in its home country of Canada and the United States. The Cineplex Odeon brand is still being used by Cineplex Entertainment at ...
.


Construction

A
groundbreaking Groundbreaking, also known as cutting, sod-cutting, turning the first sod, or a sod-turning ceremony, is a traditional ceremony in many cultures that celebrates the first day of construction for a building or other project. Such ceremonies are ...
ceremony for the complex was held on November 12, 1986. That month, workers began excavating the site to 17 feet below grade; the excavation was completed by February 1987. ''Newsday'' reported that the development of Worldwide Plaza would relocate the western boundary of Midtown Manhattan westward to Eighth Avenue. In June 1987, the Sonnenblick-Goldman Corporation secured a $545 million construction loan from a
syndicate A syndicate is a self-organizing group of individuals, companies, corporations or entities formed to transact some specific business, to pursue or promote a shared interest. Etymology The word ''syndicate'' comes from the French word ''syndicat ...
of 15 banks in the United States, Japan, Canada, and Europe. The financing was one of the largest estate loans in New York City history. In exchange for receiving the loan, the development group provided a letter of credit and personal guarantees worth $100 million. ''The Wall Street Journal'' described the loan as part of a trend wherein "the mere mention of a Zeckendorf project had bankers falling over each other to offer financing". At the time of Worldwide Plaza's development, demand for office space in New York City had declined following Black Monday in 1987. The design of One Worldwide Plaza's basement and ground level was influenced by the location of the new subway entrances at the base. While the developers negotiated with the
New York City Transit Authority The New York City Transit Authority (also known as NYCTA, the TA, or simply Transit, and branded as MTA New York City Transit) is a New York state public-benefit corporations, public-benefit corporation in the U.S. state of New York (state), New ...
(NYCTA) for a year and a half, contractors started pouring the foundations. The concrete for the foundation was poured by April 1987, and work on the steel superstructure began the following month. The construction of the complex proceeded as scheduled until July 1987, when ironworkers went on strike, for three weeks delaying the project by approximately one month. By the end of 1987, it was taking longer than expected to install the stonework inside the lobby. Installation of the exterior masonry had fallen three months behind schedule and did not commence until February 1988. The stonework ultimately cost significantly more than HRH Construction's original estimate.


Completion

One Worldwide Plaza was topped-out with a ceremony on May 20, 1988, in which ironworkers inscribed their names on a beam that was then lifted to the roof. Work on the interior finishes began that month. The interior fit-out of Ogilvy's offices, originally slated to begin in April 1988, did not begin until that November. The completion of Worldwide Plaza was ultimately delayed by four months and exceeded the original budget by 10 percent. Most of the space at One Worldwide Plaza was leased even before the building was completed. In August 1988, the law firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore leased in exchange for a 7 percent equity stake in Worldwide Plaza. The lease occurred at a time when the offices of all of Manhattan's accounting firms and corporate law firms were east of Sixth Avenue. The law firm's lease also stipulated that Zeckendorf buy and demolish an adult movie theater just north of One Worldwide Plaza. Cravath, Swaine & Moore and Ogilvy & Mather each had their own entrances and elevators, and the developers gave large "work letters" to both firms, compensating for the cost of interior furnishings. These two tenants alone accounted for 55 percent of the space. By early 1989, more than 90 percent of the space at One Worldwide Plaza had been leased, and 65 percent of the apartments had also been sold. Advertising agency N. W. Ayer & Son agreed to move into at One Worldwide Plaza, and it also took an equity stake in the complex. Record label PolyGram had leased .


Opening and early years

Worldwide Plaza was completed in 1989, and a temporary certificate of occupancy was issued that February. The Worldwide Cinemas multiplex beneath the complex opened in June 1989, and Cravath, Swaine & Moore moved into One Worldwide Plaza that September. Ogilvy's offices were completed behind schedule, costing the developers several million dollars. By then, Zeckendorf was developing several additional structures along the midtown section of Eighth Avenue, including two buildings directly next to Worldwide Plaza. Soon after the complex opened, Lifetime Cable Network also leased space at One Worldwide Plaza, as did electronics company
Philips Koninklijke Philips N.V. (), commonly shortened to Philips, is a Dutch multinational conglomerate corporation that was founded in Eindhoven in 1891. Since 1997, it has been mostly headquartered in Amsterdam, though the Benelux headquarters i ...
. The residences within the complex were not fully sold until 1993, and a quarter of the retail space was still empty in 1996. Although the offices were fully occupied in the mid-1990s, the office space was not as profitable as Zeckendorf had originally projected. Three of One Worldwide Plaza's largest tenants had only agreed to rent space in exchange for equity, while other tenants such as PolyGram,
Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...
, and Roberts & Holland paid less rent per square foot compared to other Midtown buildings. In addition,
Deutsche Bank Deutsche Bank AG (), sometimes referred to simply as Deutsche, is a German multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, and dual-listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and the New York Sto ...
held a $600 million mortgage loan on Worldwide Plaza. In the wake of Black Monday, the developers were barely able to make mortgage payments as long as the building's original tenants continued to pay rent. By 1996, Deutsche Bank was looking to sell its mortgage. Zeckendorf's syndicate wished to find a partner to help buy the mortgage from Deutsche Bank, with little success. At the time, One Worldwide Plaza was fully occupied by several large tenants with long leases, but the average rent for office space had decreased about one-third since 1990. That October, the
Blackstone Group Blackstone Inc. is an American alternative investment management company based in New York City. Blackstone's private equity business has been one of the largest investors in leveraged buyouts in the last three decades, while its real estate bu ...
bought the mortgage from Deutsche Bank for $300 million. Blackstone extended PolyGram's and Ayer's leases. Ogilvy had decided to relocate, though other companies quickly expressed interest in Ogilvy's vacant space. In October 1998,
Equity Office Properties EQ Office is a real estate investment company that owns 80 office properties comprising 40 million square feet. The company is owned by funds managed by The Blackstone Group. The company was formerly known as Equity Office. History The company w ...
agreed to acquire the complex for about $310 million, and it also agreed to assume the $268.1 million in debt on the property. As part of a pilot program,
Captivate Network Captivate is a digital media company with a network of 12,000 high-resolution, flat-panel elevator and lobby displays in 1,800 premier office buildings across North America. Published in two countries and two languages, the network spans over 31 m ...
installed electronic screens in One Worldwide Plaza's elevators, and the majority of the building's elevators had these screens by late 1999.


2000s and early 2010s

The administration of mayor Rudy Giuliani sued the owners of Worldwide Plaza and two other buildings in 2000, alleging that these buildings' privately owned public spaces violated city laws. At Worldwide Plaza, two restaurants had illegally taken over many movable chairs and tables, which had been installed there as "public amenities". The suit was settled in mid-2002 after Equity Office applied to convert ten percent of the plaza's space into a private dining area for the complex's restaurants. Meanwhile, the Loews Cineplex at Worldwide Plaza closed in early 2001 after its operator went bankrupt. The former multiplex temporarily served as office space for accounting firm
Deloitte Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited (), commonly referred to as Deloitte, is an international professional services network headquartered in London, England. Deloitte is the largest professional services network by revenue and number of professio ...
later that year after that firm's offices were destroyed in the
September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commer ...
. The multiplex then became an Off-Broadway venue, Dodger Stages (now
New World Stages New World Stages is a five-theater, Off-Broadway performing arts complex in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It is between 49th and 50th Streets beneath the plaza of the Worldwide Plaza complex at Eighth Avenue. ...
), in 2004. In February 2007, after a bidding war with
Vornado Realty Trust Vornado Realty Trust is a real estate investment trust formed in Maryland in 1982, with its primary office in New York City. The company invests in office buildings and street retail in Manhattan. Investments Notable properties owned by the ...
, Blackstone acquired Equity Office's portfolio, including One Worldwide Plaza and seven other buildings. The firm immediately resold the structures to Harry B. Macklowe as part of a $7 billion transaction; One Worldwide Plaza alone was worth $1.7 billion. Macklowe took out a $7.6 billion loan to fund the acquisitions, which was to come due within twelve months. Macklowe personally pledged $1 billion, as well as interests in twelve other properties, as a
guarantee Guarantee is a legal term more comprehensive and of higher import than either warranty or "security". It most commonly designates a private transaction by means of which one person, to obtain some trust, confidence or credit for another, engages ...
. By February 2008, the Macklowe Organization had no way to refinance the debt from the previous year. As such, Macklowe surrendered One Worldwide Plaza to his lender, Deutsche Bank. After selling Macklowe's other buildings, Deutsche Bank announced in June 2009 that it would sell One Worldwide Plaza. The next month, Deutsche Bank agreed to sell the building for $600 million to George Comfort and Sons. One Worldwide Plaza was only 46 percent occupied at the time, and the building still had a 40 percent vacancy rate at the end of the year. Television station
WNET WNET (channel 13), branded on-air as "Thirteen" (stylized as "THIRTEEN"), is a primary PBS member television station licensed to Newark, New Jersey, United States, serving the New York City area. Owned by The WNET Group (formerly known as the ...
leased space at One Worldwide Plaza in 2010. Japanese investment bank Nomura agreed to lease around in 2011, bringing the building to 95 percent occupancy. The bank beat out law firm Wilmer Hale, which had also been interested in the space. George Comfort & Sons put the building up for sale in August 2012, reportedly hoping for a $1.7 billion valuation, almost triple what the company had paid just three years prior. By October 2012, bids for the building only reached around $1.5 billion. Potential buyers were reportedly worried about the building's tenants including Nomura, which had recently had its
credit rating A credit rating is an evaluation of the credit risk of a prospective debtor (an individual, a business, company or a government), predicting their ability to pay back the debt, and an implicit forecast of the likelihood of the debtor defaulting. ...
downgraded by
Moody's Investors Service Moody's Investors Service, often referred to as Moody's, is the bond credit rating business of Moody's Corporation, representing the company's traditional line of business and its historical name. Moody's Investors Service provides internationa ...
, and Cravath, after the law firm Dewey & LeBoeuf had declared bankruptcy earlier that year. Deutsche Bank provided a $710 million mortgage on the property in February 2013.


American Realty Capital ownership

American Realty Capital New York Recovery
REIT A real estate investment trust (REIT) is a company that owns, and in most cases operates, income-producing real estate. REITs own many types of commercial real estate, including office and apartment buildings, warehouses, hospitals, shopping ce ...
, one of several companies owned by New York real estate mogul Nicholas Schorsch, acquired a 48.9 percent interest in the property for $220 million in November 2013, as well as the rights to buy the remaining 51.1%. The move came several months after
Scott Rechler Scott Rechler is an American businessman. He is CEO and Chairman of RXR Realty (NY). He is the former vice chairman of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and current chairman of the Regional Plan Association, and a member of the Met ...
's
RXR Realty RXR Realty is a real estate owner, manager, and developer located in New York City and surrounding areas of Westchester County, Long Island, New Jersey, and Connecticut. The company is headquartered in New York, New York and Uniondale, New York. RX ...
had attempted to purchase the building for $1.25 billion. RXR sued American Realty Capital in an attempt to prevent the latter from acquiring ownership of the building. RXR continued its lawsuit even after American Realty Capital had bought the building. During the 2010s, Cravath, Swaine & Moore and Nomura Securities each continued to occupy roughly . M. Shanken Communications (owner of Wine Spectator) and CBS-TV both leased space in 2014, followed the next year by Howard J. Rubenstein's Rubenstein Associates and Prometheus Global Media. These transactions brought the building to full occupancy. American Realty Capital placed One Worldwide Plaza for sale in January 2017. The firm exercised its option to purchase an additional 49.9 percent stake in June 2017 for $277 million, bringing the company's ownership to 98.8%. While the company had initially hoped to sell its entire stake in the building, bidders were discouraged by the property's existing $870 million mortgage, and foreign entities had decreased their investment in New York real estate. American Realty Capital opted to sell only a non-controlling stake in the building and pursue a
refinancing Refinancing is the replacement of an existing debt obligation with another debt obligation under a different term and interest rate. The terms and conditions of refinancing may vary widely by country, province, or state, based on several economic ...
. That September, RXR Realty and
SL Green Realty SL Green Realty Corp. is a real estate investment trust that primarily invests in office buildings and shopping centers in New York City. As of December 31, 2019, the company owned 43 properties comprising 14,438,964 square feet. Notable proper ...
agreed to purchase a 48.7 percent stake in One Worldwide Plaza, valuing the building at $1.73 billion. Following the acquisition, American Realty Capital owned 50.1 percent of the building's equity and George Comfort & Sons maintained a 1.2 percent stake. At the time, the tenants included Nomura Holdings; Cravath, Swaine and Moore; CBS; and
WebMD WebMD is an American corporation known primarily as an online publisher of news and information pertaining to human health and well-being. The site includes information pertaining to drugs. It is one of the top healthcare websites. It was fou ...
. Goldman Sachs agreed to provide a $1.2 billion loan to refinance the property following the acquisition. The
commercial mortgage-backed security Commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) are a type of mortgage-backed security backed by commercial and multifamily mortgages rather than residential real estate. CMBS tend to be more complex and volatile than residential mortgage-backed ...
(CMBS) loan closed on October 17 and was one of the largest CMBS loans on a New York office building since the
financial crisis of 2007–08 Finance is the study and discipline of money, currency and capital assets. It is related to, but not synonymous with economics, the study of production, distribution, and consumption of money, assets, goods and services (the discipline of f ...
. Shortly after origination, Goldman Sachs syndicated 25 percent of the loan to Deutsche Bank. The loan consisted of $940 million in
senior debt In finance, senior debt, frequently issued in the form of senior notes or referred to as senior loans, is debt that takes priority over other unsecured or otherwise more "junior" debt owed by the issuer. Senior debt has greater seniority in the is ...
and a $260 million junior loan. At the time, an appraisal valued the property at $1.74 billion since the building was 98.4 percent occupied and generating net cash flows of over $85 million a year. In November 2019, West Monroe Partners leased one floor.


Reception

When One Worldwide Plaza was announced, ''New York Times'' architecture critic
Paul Goldberger Paul Goldberger (born in 1950) is an American author, architecture critic and lecturer. He is known for his "Sky Line" column in ''The New Yorker''. Biography Shortly after starting as a reporter at ''The New York Times'' in 1972, he was assign ...
criticized the cheapness of the building's materials, including the use of brick and the lack of granite, as well as the large massing of the tower and the small size of the driveway. He also noted the building's inspiration from the New York Life Building and Crown Building. Nonetheless, Goldberger wrote: "In general, this is the sort of plan the West Side of midtown Manhattan has been waiting for." Following Worldwide Plaza's completion, Goldberger declared that the project had "turned one of the harshest blocks of midtown Manhattan into a glittering island of corporate luxury." He did describe One Worldwide Plaza's lower stories as resembling "stone wallpaper" because the cladding was so thin.
Herbert Muschamp Herbert Mitchell Muschamp (November 28, 1947 – October 2, 2007) was an American architecture critic. Early years Born in Philadelphia, Muschamp described his childhood home life as follows: "The living room was a secret. A forbidden zone. ...
, also of the ''Times'', regarded the building as one of the city's "Art Deco retreads". Jonathan Yardley of ''The Washington Post'' wrote: "Worldwide within its single city block thus epitomizes the transformation from commercial to residential, and it does so in buildings of singular handsomeness and distinction." The architect
Robert A. M. Stern Robert Arthur Morton Stern, usually credited as Robert A. M. Stern (born May 23, 1939), is a New York City–based architect, educator, and author. He is the founding partner of the architecture firm, Robert A.M. Stern Architects, also known a ...
described One Worldwide Plaza as "the first office building of any importance to be built west of Eighth Avenue" since
330 West 42nd Street 330 West 42nd Street, also the McGraw-Hill Building and formerly the GHI Building, is a skyscraper in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. Designed by Raymond Hood and J. André Fouilhoux in a mixture of the Internati ...
was completed in 1931. Ylonda Gault of ''
Crain's New York Crain Communications Inc is an American multi-industry publishing conglomerate based in Detroit, Michigan, United States, with 13 non-US subsidiaries. History Gustavus Dedman (G.D.) Crain, Jr. ( Gustavus Demetrious Crain, Jr.; 1885–1973), pre ...
'' wrote that One Worldwide Plaza's completion had "catapulted Mr. Childs to celebrity status in architect circles". Conversely, Daniel Bluestone wrote for ''Design Book Review'' in 1992: "For all of its massive display of urbanity, the recoil of the development from its neighborhood is striking."
Nicolai Ouroussoff Nicolai Ouroussoff (russian: Николай Владимирович Урусов; born October 3, 1962) is a writer and educator who was an architecture critic for the ''Los Angeles Times'' and ''The New York Times''. Biography Born in Cambridg ...
described One Worldwide Plaza as having a "pointless circular arcade" and said that, like the Hearst Tower several blocks north, the building had a "strained relationship to the streets below".
Brendan Gill Brendan Gill (October 4, 1914 – December 27, 1997) was an American journalist. He wrote for ''The New Yorker'' for more than 60 years. Gill also contributed film criticism for ''Film Comment'', wrote about design and architecture for Architectu ...
, writing for ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'' in 1990, criticized the project as having "cool reasonableness", which he saw as "a defect that its designers and builders must have seen as a virtue". Gill also disliked the fact that the complex's largest structure (One Worldwide Plaza) was on Eighth Avenue rather than the middle of the block, and he believed the classical detailing to be excessive. Eric Nash wrote in 2005 that the building "lacks Rockefeller Center's sweetly naive spirit, yet still manages to be a distinctive presence on the midtown skyline". Worldwide Plaza's construction was documented in a five-episode
PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...
miniseries. In addition, Karl Sabbagh wrote the book ''Skyscraper: The Making of a Building'' to complement the PBS miniseries. Goldberger wrote that the series was focused largely on the process of actually constructing Worldwide Plaza, rather than "the majesty and ambition of the American skyscraper", as Childs had intended for One Worldwide Plaza to be.


See also

*
List of tallest buildings in the United States The world's first skyscraper was built in Chicago in 1885. Since then, the United States has been home to some of the world's tallest skyscrapers. New York City, specifically the borough of Manhattan, notably has the tallest skyline in the cou ...


References


Notes


Citations


Sources

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External links

* {{Official, http://www.rxrrealty.com/property/new-york-city/manhattan/worldwide-plaza/ *
One Worldwide Plaza
' on
CTBUH The Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat (CTBUH) is an international body in the field of tall buildings and sustainable urban design. A non-profit organization based at the Monroe Building in the city of Chicago, Illinois, United States ...
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One Worldwide Plaza
' on Emporis *
One Worldwide Plaza
' on
Skyscraperpage.com SkyscraperPage is a website for skyscraper hobbyists and enthusiasts that tracks existing and proposed skyscrapers around the world. The site is owned by Skyscraper Source Media, a supplier of skyscraper diagrams for the publication, marketing, an ...
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One Worldwide Plaza
' on Structurae *
One Worldwide Plaza
' on in-arch.net 1980s architecture in the United States 1989 establishments in New York City Eighth Avenue (Manhattan) Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan Office buildings completed in 1989 Office buildings in Manhattan Skidmore, Owings & Merrill buildings Postmodern architecture in New York City