Design Reserach Project
Page 19
Public Contribution in High-Rise Building Design
@ New York City
Rockefeller Center : The City within the City
The Modern Complex
 
Exxon Building
Background
It was built in 1967-1971 as the second building in the Rockefeller Center Extension across Sixth Avenue, with the Exxon oil company as the main occupant.
The first plans for the three new office towers, eventually called the Exxon, McGraw-Hill and Celanese buildings, were made in 1963 by Harrison and Abramovitz. The "XYZ" plan arranged the buildings around a large sunken central plaza (with entrances to the new buildings, as well as the Rockefeller Center concourse), with the centermost one placed north-south, at right angles to the established Manhattan gridline. In the realized plan, however, all the buildings were placed east-west on adjacent plots.
Due to the buildings' excess bulk, as opposed to the allowances given by zoning, the western ends of the plots were to be used as north-south public promenades running through each block.
The 54-storey Exxon building occupies the plot opposite the GE Building, and its vertically accentuated form rises to the height of 228.5 m, being the second-tallest building in whole Rockefeller Center. Wrapping around the western portion of the building is a seven-storey base. The building houses 195,200 mē of internal space.
The vertical facade striping consists of narrow limestone-clad piers as vertical structural members, with a similar structural system used on the other buildings within the new complex. The windows are washed by an automatic washing machine that slides down the facade from the top, washing the windows along the way. The windows of the bottom six-seven floors are washed from scaffolding by hand.