US Trust Corporate Headquarters | commercial, office building, postmodern (architecture)

 commercial, office building, postmodern (architecture)

386-foot, 27-story postmodern office building completed in 1989. Designed by Fox & Fowle, it is clad in dark-red brick and grey Caledonia granite. The double-height main entrance is centered on 47th Street, with a recessed glass wall and two sets of revolving doors; the side and ceiling panels of the entrance feature glass panels lit from within. The base is clad in grey granite, two stories tall at the ends and three stories tall at the central entrance. To the east of the entrance are two ground-floor storefronts; to the right is another as well as a corridor in the west bay running through the building to 46th Street. There are four square windows at the 2nd floor on either side of the entrance, and three windows at the granite-clad middle section of the 3rd floor.

The 3rd-5th floors at the ends are clad in brick, with four windows on each side; there are grey metal panels at the bases of the windows, and horizontal bands of darker brick lining the upper and lower spandrels between floors. A grey metal band course marks the setback above the 5th floor. The middle section is organized into five bays; the middle three have double-windows divided by grey metal mullions, recessed between the brick piers, and with grey metal panels at the bases. The outer of the five bays are narrower up to the 5th-floor end-bay setbacks, and then have angled corners, receding back to the set-back wall on either side. The piers are decorated with projecting geometric brickwork at the 5th floor (also on the angled side walls). The middle section also sets back above the 7th floor.

Above, the end bays continue with three windows on each side, up to setbacks above the 14th floor (above which there are paired windows), and the middle section continues up to a setback above the 21st floor, with the same arrangement of angled sides. The end-bay setbacks are deeper, creating a half-octagonal tower in the middle as it ascends, fully revealed by the final end-bay setbacks above the 23rd floor.

The middle section culminates in an octagonal crown at the top floor clad in silver zinc, with three square windows in each facet. Above the windows, the sides angle inward and continue as an 8-sided cone (bisected halfway by a horizontal band of vents for the mechanical equipment within) with a flat top. A small section of flat roof connect to a matching, but slightly offset tower cone on the south side of the lot.

The south facade on 46th Street has a 1-story grey granite base organized into five bays, widest in the middle. The three eastern bays all originally had no openings, but instead have recessed blind panels mimicking placement of would-be windows. A new opening was created in the eastern bay in 2016, to create an entrance to an event space called Convene; it has glass double-doors set in a glass surround filling the entire bay. The 2nd-from-west bay is the south end of the passageway through the block, and the west bay has a loading dock with a roll-down metal gate.

At the 2nd-5th floor, the end bays have smaller paired windows, and the middle section has nine single-windows. Above the setback at the 6th floor, the middle section is further recessed, creating two end wings, each with a single-window toward the center and smaller paired windows at the ends. The end wings have angled inner sides, each with a single-window, that connect back with the further-recessed middle section, which matches its counterpart on the north facade. The end wings set back above the 14th floor, narrowing to just the bay of paired windows, and then end at the 21st floor.

The west elevation has five square windows at the north end, and four at the south, with six more offset south of center. The 4-window south end, and the 6-window middle-south section both slightly project out from the north end of the elevation. The northern projection is deeper, and has a bay of north-facing windows. Above the 14th-floor setbacks, the north section reduces to three windows, and the south to two. All but the southernmost window at the 15th-6th floors are replaced by grey metal vents.

US Trust is now a division of Bank of America Private Bank.

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