425 Park Avenue

Photograph taken at the 2024 “Make New York History” event honoring Lord Norman Foster as a Notable New Yorker, hosted by The Skyscraper Museum at the Diagrid Club, 425 Park Avenue, on May 27, 2024.

425 Park Avenue
Between 55th & 56th Streets, Manhattan

Kahn and Jacobs (1957) / Foster + Partners (2016)

The development of 425 Park Avenue from a residential block to a commercial block in the 1950s and from an antiquated office space to the Norman Foster skyscraper in the 2010s is often used to explain general trends on Park Avenue including its demand in commercial real estate, a new focus on safety precautions following 9/11, and a struggle for architectural development within pre-East Midtown Rezoning rules in 2017. 425 Park Avenue’s modern development began in 2006 with the 1$ billion ground lease by L&L Holdings and, in 2015, with construction on the new 425 Park Avenue. Many newspapers articles quote Mr. Levinson of L&L Holdings to showcase how the frustration with 1961 rules and the “sunrise” provision of new office buildings led to the approval of the East Midtown Rezoning plan. Today, 425 Park Avenue stands also as a barometer of Midtown’s commercial appetite—its upper floors commanding record-breaking rents of over $300 per square foot.