Chanin Building

The building is at 122 East 42nd Street in the Midtown and Murray Hill neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City, New York, U.S. It is bounded by Lexington Avenue to the east, 42nd Street to the north, and 41st Street to the south. The lot measures along 42nd Street, along 41st Street, and along Lexington Avenue. The building is assigned its own ZIP Code, 10168; it was one of 41 buildings in Manhattan that had their own ZIP Codes . The Chanin Building is part of the Terminal City area around Grand Central Terminal; directly to the west are 110 East 42nd Street and the Pershing Square Building. The Grand Hyatt New York hotel is located across 42nd Street, while the Socony-Mobil Building is located across Lexington Avenue and the Chrysler Building is diagonally across both streets. == Architecture ==

The Chanin Building was designed by Sloan & Robertson in the Art Deco style. it contains 56 stories. The design was mostly the work of Rene Paul Chambellan and Jacques Delamarre. The former specialized in architectural sculpture in numerous styles, such as the Art Deco style, while the latter led the staff of the Chanin Company. Form The Chanin Building employs a series of setbacks Because of the varying widths of the surrounding streets, three separate groups of setbacks were mandated for each elevation of the facade as per the 1916 Zoning Resolution. The Chanin Building's massing was inspired by that of Eliel Saarinen's unbuilt proposal for Chicago's Tribune Tower. Though the building is primarily designed in the Art Deco style, the massing also exhibits design characteristics of the International Style. Facade is visible at left The Chanin Building is clad with buff brick, limestone, and terracotta. There are three entrances to the building's office stories, which are ornamented with eight plaster reliefs of personified figures against a geometric pattern. Two of the reliefs symbolize achievement and success, while the other six depict physical and mental attributes by which those objectives are attained. The base of the building bears black Belgian marble around the storefront windows, which are each made of plate glass. These storefront windows correspond to two bays on upper stories, allowing for wide displays. A second terracotta frieze runs the whole length of the lower facade, presenting a dramatic collection of angular zigzags and curvy leaves. A bas-relief by Edward Trumbull, designed in the Art Deco style, wraps around the facade. The crown, above the Chanin Company's 52nd-story offices, contains abstract-patterned projecting ornamentation, with buttresses outside the 53rd floor. Originally, 212 artificial candles at the crown of the Chanin Building provided the equivalent of 30 million candlepower. These lights, meant to highlight the details of the building, were characteristic of the Art Deco style; The bronze ornamentation continues in the waves on the floor, mailboxes, and elevator doors, extending the general Art Deco style from the outside inward. Originally, the floors had lozenge-shaped panels, but heavy pedestrian traffic wore down these panels over the years. Also inside are 21 high speed passenger elevators, split up into three elevator banks, The terminal was outfitted with marble surfaces and also contained waiting rooms and ticket offices. Upper floors , these gates led to the private offices of Irwin S. Chanin The third through 48th floors consist almost entirely of leasable office space, while the 49th and 50th floors contain the Chanin brothers' boardroom and offices. The floors above were originally the offices of the Chanin Organization, with an Art Deco restroom that a building trade convention's judges referred to as "America's finest bathroom". s at the Chanin Building's crenellated top As a dominant landmark in the midtown skyline upon its opening, the building had an open-air observation deck on the 54th floor. Over the years, several people have committed suicide by jumping off the 54th floor observation deck. In later years, other nearby buildings surpassed the Chanin Building in height (including the Chrysler Building, diagonally across Lexington Avenue and 42nd Street), and so the observation deck was closed in the mid-20th century. In 1965, the transmitter was moved to the Empire State Building. == History ==

The completion of the underground Grand Central Terminal in 1913 resulted in the rapid development of Terminal City, the area around Grand Central, as well as a corresponding increase in real-estate prices. Among these were the New York Central Building at 47th Street and Park Avenue, as well as the Grand Central Palace across 42nd Street from the present Chanin Building. By 1920, the area had become what The New York Times called "a great civic centre". One site that had yet to be redeveloped was the Manhattan Storage Warehouse, which was built in 1882 He and his brother Henry I. Chanin designed their first Manhattan buildings in 1924. They then built and operated a number of theaters and other structures related to the entertainment industry, including the Roxy Theatre and the Hotel Lincoln. Chanin believed the area around Grand Central Terminal had potential for growth because of the construction of hotels and apartment buildings at Tudor City, Sutton Place, and Lexington and Park Avenues. Development The first plan for a skyscraper at the Chanin Building site was made in 1925, when a developer proposed a 35-story skyscraper. The Chanin brothers initially planned to erect a bulky square 45-story tower designed by Rouse & Goldstone. The warehouse itself was difficult to clear, since its walls had been designed to protect against "burglary, fire and assault". The process entailed clearing away 7,500 truck loads of brick, 1,000 of scrap metal, and 3,500 of loose earth. The official plans for the Chanin Building were filed with the New York City Department of Buildings in June 1927, at which point 60 percent of the warehouse had been demolished. Sloan & Robertson, architects of the nearby Graybar Building, Pershing Square Building, and 110 East 42nd Street, were hired to design the Chanin Building. The steel frame weighed an estimated and was held together by 1.5 million rivets and 160,000 bolts. Crowds frequently stopped to observe the construction process. The erection of the frame was not without problems: in one incident, the boom of a construction derrick fell from the 20th floor, nearly splitting a truck in half, though no one was injured or killed. The steelwork was completed by that June, The building held its topping out ceremony in August 1928. The Chanin Building thus became the first major skyscraper in Terminal City, and the third-tallest building in New York City behind the Woolworth Building and the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company Tower. Irwin Chanin was instead focused on attracting tenants with an "efficient, up-to-date" facility. Initially, the lobby space was occupied by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad's bus terminal, ticket offices, and waiting rooms. The office space included such tenants as the Kimberly-Clark paper company, Pan American Petroleum and Transport Company, and Fairchild Aircraft, while the Chanin company took all the space above the 50th floor. and a self-service and table-service restaurant opened in the basement. Through the Great Depression, leasing proceeded actively. The building's owners filed to reorganize the operations of the Lexington Avenue and 42nd Street Corporation, which operated the Chanin Building, in 1947. In subsequent years, the Chanin Building continued to attract tenants such as Guest Keen and Nettlefolds, a Howard Johnson's restaurant, and the Barry Goldwater 1964 presidential campaign's New York state headquarters. In addition, the building hosted U.S. Chess Championships. Despite this success, the Chanin Building faced some issues: its owners, along with those of the Nelson Tower and Century Apartments, were charged with real estate tax fraud in 1974. The Chanin Building's owners were estimated to have evaded $138,549 in real estate taxes. The Chanin Building was designated a city landmark by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission in 1978, and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1980. By the 1990s, the building was owned by a syndicate headed by Stanley Stahl. Modern tenants include Apple Bank, of which Stahl was the only stockholder, as well as the International Rescue Committee, which had moved to the building in 1994. == Critical reception ==

Shortly after the building's completion, architectural critic Matlack Price wrote in an Architectural Forum article that the building was "a splendid contribution to the architecture of all time", and that "The architects have not here compromised a fine vision either with major errors in scale or with minor trivialities." A promotional brochure, with artwork by Hugh Ferriss, described the Chanin Building as the "mise en scène for the romantic drama of American business." The fifth edition of the AIA Guide to New York City, published in 2010, characterized the Chanin Building as being "classic style, rather than stylish ephemera. Such distinguished self-improvement seems beyond the grasp of current developers." Historian Donald L. Miller stated, "Restrained on the outside, the inside is exuberantly ornate". == See also ==