Hearst Tower

Hearst Tower
Hearst Tower in 2006
Information
Location	300 West 57 Street New York City, U.S.
Status	Complete
Groundbreaking	30 April 2003
Constructed	2003-2006
Opening	2006
Use	Office
Height
Roof	182 m (597 ft)
Technical details
Floor count	46
Floor area	80,000 square metres (861,100 sq ft)
Companies
Architect	Foster + Partners Gensler Adamson Associates Architects
Structural Engineer	WSP Cantor Seinuk

Hearst Tower in New York City, New York is located at 300 West 57th Street, 959 8th Avenue, near Columbus Circle. It is the world headquarters of the Hearst Corporation, bringing together for the first time their numerous publications and communications companies under one roof, including among others Cosmopolitan, Esquire and the San Francisco Chronicle.

The former six-story headquarters building was commissioned by the founder, William Randolph Hearst and awarded to the architect Joseph Urban. The building was completed in 1928 at a cost of $2 million and contained 40,000 sq ft (3,700 m²). The original cast stone facade has been preserved in the new design as a designated Landmark site. Originally built as the base for a proposed skyscraper, the construction of the tower was postponed due to the Great Depression. The new tower addition was completed nearly eighty years later, and 2000 Hearst employees moved in on 4 May 2006.^[1]

The tower – designed by the architect Norman Foster, structural engineered by WSP Cantor Seinuk, and constructed by Turner construction – is 46 stories tall, standing 182 m (597 ft) with 80,000 m² (856,000 ft²) of office space. The uncommon triangular framing pattern (also known as a diagrid) required 9,500 metric tons (10,480 tons) of structural steel – reportedly about 20% less than a conventional steel frame. Hearst Tower was the first skyscraper to break ground in New York City after September 11, 2001. The building received the 2006 Emporis Skyscraper Award.^[2] citing it as the best skyscraper in the world completed that year.

Hearst Tower is the first "green" high rise office building completed in New York City, with a number of environmental considerations built into the plan. The floor of the atrium is paved with heat conductive limestone. Polyethylene tubing is embedded under the floor and filled with circulating water for cooling in the summer and heating in the winter. Rain collected on the roof is stored in a tank in the basement for use in the cooling system, to irrigate plants and for the water sculpture in the main lobby. 90% of the building's structural steel contains recycled material. Overall, the building has been designed to use 26% less energy than the minimum requirements for the city of New York, and earned a gold designation from the United States Green Building Council’s LEED certification program, becoming New York City's first LEED Gold skyscraper.

The atrium features escalators which run through a 3-story water sculpture titled Icefall, a wide waterfall built with thousands of glass panels, which cools and humidifies the lobby air. The water element is complemented by a 70-foot (21.3 m) tall fresco painting entitled Riverlines by artist Richard Long.

Gallery

Interior of the Lobby taken from "Cafe 57"

A closeup of building's facade.

The exterior of the base.

References

Further reading

• Dirk Stichweh: New York Skyscrapers. Prestel Publishing, Munich 2009, ISBN 3791340549

Film

UP TO THE SKY: Hearst Tower, New York. Documentary by Sabine Pollmeier and Joachim Haupt. 2009

External links

• The Hearst Tower: a case study on Constructalia
• Hearst Tower on Emporis
• Hearst Magazine Tower in the Structurae database
• in-Arch.net: The Hearst Magazine Building background
• New York Architect Images
• Model of the Hearst Tower for Google Sketchup and Google Earth
• Luxis Hearst Tower New York, NY
• Hearst Tower in New York City Structural detail and images.

Coordinates: 40°46′00″N 73°59′00″W / 40.766538°N 73.983452°W / 40.766538; -73.983452