Lever House

For the building in South Carolina, see Lever Building. For the building in London, see Unilever House.

Lever House
Lever House, a 23-story tower with a green-glass facade, as seen from the intersection of Park Avenue and 53rd Street
Seen from Park Avenue and 53rd Street
Map
General information
Location390 Park Avenue
Manhattan, New York, U.S.
Coordinates40°45′35″N 73°58′22″W / 40.75972°N 73.97278°W / 40.75972; -73.97278
Construction started1950; 74 years ago (1950)
OpenedApril 29, 1952; 72 years ago (1952-04-29)
OwnerBrookfield Properties, WatermanClark
Height307 ft (94 m)
Technical details
Floor count21
Design and construction
Architect(s)Gordon Bunshaft and Natalie de Blois of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
Main contractorGeorge A. Fuller Company
Website
leverhousenyc.com
Lever House
Built1950–1952
Architectural styleInternational Style
NRHP reference No.83004078[1]
NYSRHP No.06101.001710[2]
NYCL No.1277
Significant dates
Added to NRHPOctober 2, 1983[1]
Designated NYSRHPAugust 11, 1983[2]
Designated NYCLNovember 9, 1982[3]

Lever House is a 307-foot-tall (94 m) office building at 390 Park Avenue in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. Constructed from 1950 to 1952, the building was designed by Gordon Bunshaft and Natalie de Blois of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) in the International Style, a 20th-century modern architectural style. It was originally the headquarters of soap company Lever Brothers, a subsidiary of Unilever. Lever House was the second skyscraper in New York City with a glass curtain wall, after the United Nations Secretariat Building.

The building has 21 office stories topped by a triple-height mechanical section. At the ground story is a courtyard and public space, with the second story overhanging the plaza on a set of columns. The remaining stories are designed as a slab occupying the northern one-quarter of the site. The slab design was chosen because it conformed with the city's 1916 Zoning Resolution while avoiding the use of setbacks. There is about 260,000 square feet (24,000 m2) of interior space in Lever House, making it much smaller than comparable office buildings in Midtown Manhattan.

The construction of Lever House changed Park Avenue in Midtown from an avenue with masonry apartment buildings to one with International-style office buildings. Several other structures worldwide copied the building's design. Lever House was intended solely for Lever Brothers' use, and its small size had prompted proposals to redevelop the site with a larger skyscraper. The building was nearly demolished in the 1980s, when Fisher Brothers proposed a 40-story tower on the site; afterward, it was narrowly approved as a New York City designated landmark in 1982 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places the next year. In 1997, Unilever relocated most of its offices out of Lever House, and Aby Rosen's RFR Realty took over the building. After SOM renovated the building between 2000 and 2001, Lever House was used as a standard office building with multiple tenants. SOM conducted another renovation in the early 2020s.

  1. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference nris was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ a b "Cultural Resource Information System (CRIS)". New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation. November 7, 2014. Archived from the original on April 4, 2019. Retrieved July 20, 2023.
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference NYCL p. 1 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).