ABC Broadcasting Operations Facility

 office building, 1985_construction, postmodern (architecture)

155-foot, 14-story postmodern office building completed in 1985 for the American Broadcasting Company. Designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox (led by Arthur May/Judy Di Maio) with interiors by Cioppa Rosen, it is clad in tan brick, grey granite, and glass. The layout consists of stacked studios, each at a 2-story scale. The main facade is nine bays wide. The 3rd-5th bays from the east comprise the main entrance, with the middle of these three being the widest and the other two narrower. The ground floor is recessed here between light-grey granite piers and engaged columns of polished red-grey granite. At the rear of the center bay are two sets of revolving doors, with traditional glass doors on either side. There is a loading dock with a roll-down metal gate at the east end of the ground floor, and two beige metal service doors at the west end; the other bays have blind recessed brick panels, with the granite water table below raised up at each bay.

Most of the rest of the facade is brick, with some granite accents, and granite spandrel panels below the 2nd-floor windows of the outer bays. At the 2nd floor the main entrance bay has a wide window band (with narrow, greenish glass panes separated by silver steel mullions) and a horizontal grey granite panel at the bottom across most of the bay. The narrow bay to either side has a shorter, square window flanked by taller double-windows where the outer pane is recessed. All the windows have granite sills. The outer bays all have window with four narrow panes flanked by narrow, recessed single-windows. The windows of the 3rd-4th floors are combined at each bay, and are wider, with six narrow panes abutting the recessed end panes. At the outer bays, only the end panes extend up all the way through the 4th floor; the others are shorter, with granite panels above them and between the tops of the end panes.

At the 5th-6th floors the entry bay is set back, with a projecting semi-circle extending out at the 6th floor. The outer bays have wide bands of window panes at the 6th floor, with a deep setback above the 6th floor. The 5th floor has blind granite panels at each bay. The upper floors have very large industrial-style windows with many small panes; each window is double-height. There are shallow setbacks above the 10th, 12th, & 14th floors.

The side elevations are clad in brick and have four narrow bays of multi-paned windows at the front, beginning at the 7th floor. The front two of these end at the setbacks. Farther back, on the west elevation, there are two more narrow bays, and farther back on the east elevation there is a wider bay of windows with recessed end panes. The east half of the building adjoins with the 30 West 67th Street building to the north, and they share a mechanical penthouse at the roof.

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