Daily News Building
220 East 42nd Street, 1929-1930

Architect: Howells & Hood
Structural Engineer: Weidlinger Associates
Original Owner & Tenant: Daily News
Current Owner & Tenant: SL Green Realty Corporation
Height: 476 ft / 145 m
Floors: 36

The Daily News, New York's first tabloid paper, was founded in 1919 and was immediately immensely successful; its circulation was 1.4 million, the largest in the nation, just a decade later. Its owner, Captain Joseph Medill Pederson, bought an inexpensive, mid-block property on East 42nd Street between Third and Second Avenues (the elevated train lines on these avenues made the area unappealing to most developers); he envisioned a small headquarters with editorial offices and, more importantly, a printing press, that would capitalize on easy distribution to Times Square and the rest of the city. His architect, Raymond Hood, saw that a tall rental tower would bring his client added income and create an identity for the paper. Pederson reluctantly agreed and the 476-foot tall tower pictured soon came into being. The building is actually L-shaped. A long, 10-story front along 41st Street (right) houses the printing press and loading areas; the 39-story tower (left) rises within the 90-foot wide length between 41st and 42nd Street. A deal with the city regarding the school along Third Avenue meant the building had three-and-a-half entirely unobstructed sides, uncommon for a mid-block tower. Yet it is the exterior articulation of the building that was most remarkable. Vertical piers of white brick alternate with uniform bands of recessed windows with rougher red and black brick spandrels in between. Even the crown of the building, where a false front hides the water towers, continues this pattern. Derived entirely from the needs of the uniform office spaces within, "the exterior more or less created itself," explained Hood. The stripped verticality is one of the purest expressions of "form follows function" of its period. The transmission tower for WPIX TV rises another 275 feet on top of the building (WPIX was owned and operated by the Daily News, "New York's Picture Newspaper," from the late 1940s until 1991 when the paper was sold to Rupert Murdoch). In 1958, an addition was added to the 42nd Street and 2nd Avenue corner (Harrison & Abramovitz) that repeats the exterior articulation of the tower with wider windows.