1221 Avenue of the Americas

 office building, skyscraper, 1969_construction, International style architecture

674-foot, 51-story International-style office building completed in 1969. Designed by Harrison, Abramovitz & Harris, it was formerly the McGraw-Hill Building. It is one of the so-called "XYZ" slab towers along the west side of 6th Avenue, built as an extension of Rockefeller Center.

The 35-meter setback from Sixth Avenue accommodates a sunken plaza dominated by the 15-meter abstract steel sculpture Sun Triangle by Athelstan Spilhaus. The lobby is clad in dark red terrazzo and red marble and decorated with aphorisms from Plato and John F. Kennedy.

The 52-story exterior of the building follows the Rockefeller Center extension's uniform vertical striping, with the grey-red granite piers here nearly flush with the glass surface. Around the west side of the tower is a 7-story base, behind which runs the landscaped through-block public passageway, necessitated by the city authorities for all the Rockefeller extension buildings. On the western portion of the building site is the McGraw-Hill's contribution to the through-block extension promenades, most notable by its waterfall wall, with a transparent plexiglass tunnel leading through. At the double-height ground floor, there are half as many piers as above. Glassy main entrances are located at the east end of the south base-wing, and at the middle of the north facade, just west of the protruding base-wing. The north wing contains a restaurant (Oceana), while the east end of the ground floor on 49th Street also has a restaurant (Del Frisco's). West of the entrance in the south wing, there are two more restaurant spaces (48 Lounge and Chipotle Mexican Grill) and a large loading dock at the west end.

The building is also the headquarters of Sirius XM Radio, and many radio shows broadcast from the building including The Howard Stern Show. Retail occupants in the sunken courtyard's commercial spaces include Cafe Metro, and New York Sports Clubs.

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