Works

Seagram Building

Citation Formats

General Reference

Arts and Music Atlas. "Seagram Building." Accessed August 30, 2026. https://arts.interactiveatlas.org/works/seagram-building.

APA Style

Arts and Music Atlas. (n.d.). Seagram Building. Retrieved August 30, 2026, from https://arts.interactiveatlas.org/works/seagram-building

BibTeX

@misc{artsandmusicatlas-seagram-building,
  author = {Arts and Music Atlas},
  title = {Seagram Building},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://arts.interactiveatlas.org/works/seagram-building},
  note = {Accessed August 30, 2026}
}

Commissioned after 27-year-old Phyllis Lambert persuaded her father, Seagram president Samuel Bronfman, to pass over the firm's first choice of architect and hire Mies instead. Mies set the tower back 100 feet from Park Avenue to open a public plaza, a gesture so widely admired it was written into New York's 1961 zoning code as the incentive for setback plazas citywide. Philip Johnson, credited as associate architect, designed the lobby and the building's Four Seasons and Brasserie restaurants. It stands among the most closely imitated, and most litigated over as a preservation landmark, towers of the twentieth century.

Facts

Year Created

1958 1

Location

375 Park Avenue, New York City, United States 1

Architectural Style

International Style modernism 1

Structural System

Fireproofed steel frame with applied non-structural bronze I-beam mullions expressing the structural grid; the tower is set back 100 feet from Park Avenue to form a public plaza 1

Primary Material

Bronze-toned extruded bronze and glass curtain wall on a steel frame, travertine-paved plaza 1

Building Type

Corporate office tower 1

Commissioned By

Samuel Bronfman, president of Joseph E. Seagram and Sons; the architect search was led by his daughter Phyllis Lambert 1

Storey Count

38 1

Current Use

Commercial office tower; a New York City designated landmark 1

Visitor Access

Plaza and lobby publicly accessible; office floors private 1