712 Fifth Avenue

Manhattan, United States

Exterior only

Visible from the street; the inside is private.

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Standing at the corner of 56th Street and Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, 712 Fifth Avenue is a 650-foot-tall office skyscraper completed in 1990 by the architectural firms SLCE Architects and Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates. The tower's distinctive design preserves the historic facades of two designated landmarks at its base: the 1871 Coty Building and the 1908 Rizzoli Bookstore, both integrated into the lower floors alongside a new imitation facade at 716 Fifth Avenue. Above these preserved structures rises a gleaming tower clad in white marble, gray limestone, and green and black granite, with each office floor averaging 7,500 square feet. The building's juxtaposition of contemporary design with early-twentieth-century facades drew both praise and criticism from architectural commentators. Originally planned in 1983, the project faced years of delay over opposition to demolishing the historic buildings, which were ultimately incorporated rather than removed. The skyscraper opened largely vacant during a weak real-estate market and was sold to the Paramount Group in 1999 for $285 million.