Empire State Building

Lobby

The original main lobby is accessed from Fifth Avenue, on the building's east side, and is the only place in the building where the design contains narrative motifs.^[55] It contains an entrance with one set of double doors between a pair of revolving doors. At the top of each doorway is a bronze motif depicting one of three "crafts or industries" used in the building's construction—Electricity, Masonry, and Heating.^[86] The three-story-high space runs parallel to 33rd and 34th Streets.^[87] The lobby contains two tiers of marble: a wainscoting of darker marble, topped by lighter marble. There is a pattern of zigzagging terrazzo tiles on the lobby floor, which leads from east to west.^[87] To the north and south are storefronts, which are flanked by tubes of dark rounded marble and topped by a vertical band of grooves set into the marble.^[87] Until the 1960s, there was a Longchamps restaurant next to the lobby, with six oval murals designed by Winold Reiss; these murals were placed in storage when the Longchamps closed.^[88][89]

The western ends of the north and south walls include escalators to a mezzanine level.^[87][e] At the west end of the lobby, behind the security desk, is an aluminum relief of the skyscraper as it was originally built (without the antenna).^[90] The relief, which was intended to provide a welcoming effect,^[12] contains an embossed outline of the building, with rays radiating from the spire and the sun behind it.^[91] In the background is a state map of New York with the building's location marked by a "medallion" in the very southeast portion of the outline. A compass is depicted in the bottom right and a plaque to the building's major developers is on the bottom left.^[92][91] A scale model of the building was also placed south of the security desk.^[92]

The plaque at the western end of the lobby is on the eastern interior wall of a one-story-tall rectangular-shaped corridor that surrounds the banks of escalators, with a similar design to the lobby.^[93] The rectangular-shaped corridor actually consists of two long hallways on the northern and southern sides of the rectangle,^[94] as well as a shorter hallway on the eastern side and another long hallway on the western side.^[93] At both ends of the northern and southern corridors, there is a bank of four low-rise elevators in between the corridors.^[92][55][95] The western side of the rectangular elevator-bank corridor extends north to the 34th Street entrance and south to the 33rd Street entrance. It borders three large storefronts and leads to escalators (originally stairs), which go both to the second floor and to the basement. Going from west to east, there are secondary entrances to 34th and 33rd Streets from the northern and southern corridors, respectively.^[87][e] The side entrances from 33rd and 34th Street lead to two-story-high corridors around the elevator core, crossed by stainless steel-and-glass-enclosed bridges at the mezzanine floor.^[30][38][92]

Until the 1960s, an Art Deco mural, inspired by both the sky and the Machine Age, was installed in the lobby ceilings.^[90] Subsequent damage to these murals, designed by artist Leif Neandross, resulted in reproductions being installed. Renovations to the lobby in 2009, such as replacing the clock over the information desk in the Fifth Avenue lobby with an anemometer and installing two chandeliers intended to be part of the building when it originally opened, revived much of its original grandeur.^[96] The north corridor contained eight illuminated panels created in 1963 by Roy Sparkia and Renée Nemorov, in time for the 1964 World's Fair, depicting the building as the Eighth Wonder of the World alongside the traditional seven.^[95][97] The building's owners installed a series of paintings by the New York artist Kysa Johnson in the concourse level. Johnson later filed a federal lawsuit, in January 2014, under the Visual Artists Rights Act alleging the negligent destruction of the paintings and damage to her reputation as an artist.^[98] As part of the building's 2010 renovation, Denise Amses commissioned a work consisting of 15,000 stars and 5,000 circles, superimposed on a 13-by-5-foot (4.0 by 1.5 m) etched-glass installation, in the lobby.^[99]

Elevators

The Empire State Building has 73 elevators in all, including service elevators.^[100] Its original 64 elevators, built by the Otis Elevator Company,^[80] in a central core and are of varying heights, with the longest of these elevators reaching from the lobby to the 80th floor.^[37][101] As originally built, there were four "express" elevators that connected the lobby, 80th floor, and several landings in between; the other 60 "local" elevators connected the landings with the floors above these intermediate landings.^[49] Of the 64 total elevators, 58 were for passenger use (comprising the four express elevators and 54 local elevators), and eight were for freight deliveries.^[42] The elevators were designed to move at 1,200 feet per minute (366 m/min). At the time of the skyscraper's construction, their practical speed was limited to 700 feet per minute (213 m/min) per city law, but this limit was removed shortly after the building opened.^[80][42]

Additional elevators connect the 80th floor to the six floors above it, as the six extra floors were built after the original 80 stories were approved.^[31][102] The elevators were mechanically operated until 2011, when they were replaced with automatic elevators during the $550 million renovation of the building.^[103] An additional elevator connects the 86th and 102nd floor observatories, which allows visitors access the 102nd floor observatory after having their tickets scanned. It also allows employees to access the mechanical floors located between the 87th and 101st floors.^[81]

Observation decks

The 80th, 86th, and 102nd floors contain observatories.^{[104][90][105]} The latter two observatories saw a combined average of four million visitors per year in 2010.^{[106][107][108]} Since opening, the observatories have been more popular than similar observatories at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, the Chrysler Building, the first One World Trade Center, or the Woolworth Building, despite being more expensive.^[107] There are variable charges to enter the observatories; one ticket allows visitors to go as high as the 86th floor, and there is an additional charge to visit the 102nd floor. Other ticket options for visitors include scheduled access to view the sunrise from the observatory, a "premium" guided tour with VIP access, and the "AM/PM" package which allows for two visits in the same day.^[109]

Interior and exterior observation decks at the 86th floor

The 86th floor observatory contains both an enclosed viewing gallery and an open-air outdoor viewing area, allowing for it to remain open 365 days a year regardless of the weather. The 102nd floor observatory is completely enclosed and much smaller in size. The 102nd floor observatory was closed to the public from the late 1990s to 2005 due to limited viewing capacity and long lines.^[110][111] The observation decks were redesigned in mid-1979.^[112] The 102nd floor was again redesigned in a project that was completed in 2019, allowing the windows to be extended from floor to ceiling and widening the space in the observatory overall.^[113][114] An observatory on the 80th floor, opened in 2019, includes various exhibits as well as a mural of the skyline drawn by British artist Stephen Wiltshire.^[115][105] An interactive multimedia museum, with multiple hands-on exhibitions about the building's history, was added during this project.^[116] The design of the 10,000 sq ft (930 m²) Observatory Experience was inspired by the plans and designs of the original Empire State Building.^[117]

According to a 2010 report by Concierge.com, the five lines to enter the observation decks are "as legendary as the building itself". Concierge.com stated that there were five lines: the sidewalk line, the lobby elevator line, the ticket purchase line, the second elevator line, and the line to get off the elevator and onto the observation deck.^[118] In 2016, New York City's official tourism website made note of only three lines: the security check line, the ticket purchase line, and the second elevator line.^[119] Following renovations completed in 2019, designed to streamline queuing and reduce wait times, guests enter from a single entrance on 34th Street, where they make their way through 10,000-square-foot (930 m²) exhibits on their way up to the observatories. Guests were offered a variety of ticket packages, including a package that enables them to skip the lines throughout the duration of their stay.^[114] The Empire State Building garners significant revenue from ticket sales for its observation decks, making more money from ticket sales than it does from renting office space during some years.^[107][120]

A 360° panoramic view of New York City from the 86th-floor observation deck in spring 2005. East River is to the left, Hudson River to the right, south is near center.

New York Skyride

In early 1994, a motion simulator attraction was built on the 2nd floor,^[121] as a complement to the observation deck.^[122] The original cinematic presentation lasted approximately 25 minutes, while the simulation was about eight minutes.^[123] The ride had two incarnations. The original version, which ran from 1994 until around 2002, featured James Doohan, Star Trek's Scotty, as the airplane's pilot who humorously tried to keep the flight under control during a storm.^[124][125] After the September 11 attacks in 2001, the ride was closed.^[122] An updated version debuted in mid-2002, featuring actor Kevin Bacon as the pilot, with the new flight also going haywire.^[126] This new version served a more informative goal, as opposed to the old version's main purpose of entertainment, and contained details about the 9/11 attacks.^[127] The simulator received mixed reviews, with assessments of the ride ranging from "great" to "satisfactory" to "corny".^[128]

Above the 102nd floor

The final stage of the building was the installation of a hollow mast, a 158-foot (48 m) steel shaft fitted with elevators and utilities, above the 86th floor.^[129][130] The spire of the Empire State Building was originally intended to serve as a mooring mast for zeppelins and other airships, although the plan was abandoned after high winds made that impossible.^[21] At the top would be a conical roof and the 102nd-floor docking station.^[129][130] Inside, the elevators would ascend 167 feet (51 m) from the 86th-floor ticket offices to a 33-foot-wide (10 m) 101st-floor^[f] waiting room.^[131][132] From there, stairs would lead to the 102nd floor,^[f] where passengers would enter the airships.^[129] The airships would have been moored to the spire at the equivalent of the building's 106th floor.^[132][133]

As constructed, the mast contains four rectangular tiers topped by a cylindrical shaft with a conical pinnacle.^[130] On the 102nd floor (formerly the 101st floor), there is a door with stairs ascending to the 103rd floor (formerly the 102nd).^[f] This was built as a disembarkation floor for airships tethered to the building's spire, and has a circular balcony outside.^[16] It is now an access point to reach the spire for maintenance. The room now contains electrical equipment, but celebrities and dignitaries may also be given permission to take pictures there.^[134][135] A set of stairs and a ladder ascend to the spire and are used by maintenance workers.^[134] The mast's 480 windows were all replaced in 2015.^[136] The mast serves as the base of the building's broadcasting antenna.^[130]

Inflatable objects have sometimes been mounted to the spire for promotional purposes. For example, a King Kong balloon was attached to the spire in 1983 to mark the 50th anniversary of the character's introduction,^[137] and an inflatable dragon was placed on the spire in 2024 to promote the TV series House of Dragon.^[138]

Broadcast stations

Broadcasting began at the Empire State Building on December 22, 1931, when NBC and RCA began transmitting experimental television broadcasts from a small antenna erected atop the mast, with two separate transmitters for the visual and audio data. They leased the 85th floor and built a laboratory there.^[139] In 1934, RCA was joined by Edwin Howard Armstrong in a cooperative venture to test his FM system from the building's antenna.^[140][141] This setup, which entailed the installation of the world's first FM transmitter,^[141] continued only until October of the next year due to disputes between RCA and Armstrong.^[139][140] Specifically, NBC wanted to install more TV equipment in the room where Armstrong's transmitter was located.^[141]

After some time, the 85th floor became home to RCA's New York television operations initially as experimental station W2XBS channel 1 then, from 1941, as commercial station WNBT channel 1 (now WNBC channel 4). NBC's FM station, W2XDG, began transmitting from the antenna in 1940.^[139][142] NBC retained exclusive use of the top of the building until 1950 when the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) ordered the exclusive deal be terminated. The FCC directive was based on consumer complaints that a common location was necessary for the seven extant New York-area television stations to transmit from so that receiving antennas would not have to be constantly adjusted. Other television broadcasters would later join RCA at the building on the 81st through 83rd floors, often along with sister FM stations.^[139] Construction of a dedicated broadcast tower began on July 27, 1950,^[143] with TV, and FM, transmissions starting in 1951. The 200-foot (61 m) broadcast tower was completed in 1953.^{[130][52][144]} From 1951, six broadcasters agreed to pay a combined $600,000 per year for the use of the antenna.^[145] In 1965, a separate set of FM antennae was constructed ringing the 103rd floor observation area to act as a master antenna.^[139]

The placement of the stations in the Empire State Building became a major issue with the construction of the World Trade Center's Twin Towers in the late 1960s, and early 1970s. The greater height of the Twin Towers would reflect radio waves broadcast from the Empire State Building, eventually resulting in some broadcasters relocating to the newer towers instead of suing the developer, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.^[146] Even though the nine stations who were broadcasting from the Empire State Building were leasing their broadcast space until 1984, most of these stations moved to the World Trade Center as soon as it was completed in 1971. The broadcasters obtained a court order stipulating that the Port Authority had to build a mast and transmission equipment in the North Tower, as well as pay the broadcasters' leases in the Empire State Building until 1984.^[147] Only a few broadcasters renewed their leases in the Empire State Building.^[148]

The September 11 attacks destroyed the World Trade Center and the broadcast centers atop it, leaving most of the city's stations without a transmitter for ten days until the Armstrong Tower in Alpine, New Jersey, was re-activated temporarily.^[149] By October 2001, nearly all of the city's commercial broadcast stations (both television and FM radio) were again transmitting from the top of the Empire State Building. In a report that Congress commissioned about the transition from analog television to digital television, it was stated that the placement of broadcast stations in the Empire State Building was considered "problematic" due to interference from nearby buildings. In comparison, the congressional report stated that the former Twin Towers had very few buildings of comparable height nearby thus signals suffered little interference.^[150] In 2003, a few FM stations were relocated to the nearby Condé Nast Building to reduce the number of broadcast stations using the Empire State Building.^[151] Eleven television stations and twenty-two FM stations had signed 15-year leases in the building by May 2003. It was expected that a taller broadcast tower in Bayonne, New Jersey, or Governors Island, would be built in the meantime with the Empire State Building being used as a "backup" since signal transmissions from the building were generally of poorer quality.^[152] Following the construction of One World Trade Center in the late 2000s and early 2010s, some TV stations began moving their transmitting facilities there.^[153]

As of 2021^[update], the Empire State Building is home to the following stations:^[154]

• Television: WABC-7, WPIX-11, WXTV-41 Paterson, and WFUT-68 Newark
• FM: WINS-92.3, WPAT-93.1 Paterson, WNYC-93.9, WPLJ-95.5, WXNY-96.3, WQHT-97.1, WSKQ-97.9, WEPN-98.7, WHTZ-100.3 Newark, WCBS-101.1, WFAN-101.9, WNEW-FM-102.7, WKTU-103.5 Lake Success, WAXQ-104.3, WWPR-105.1, WQXR-105.9 Newark, WLTW-106.7, and WBLS-107.5
• NOAA Weather Radio station KWO35 broadcasts at a frequency of 162.550 MHz from the National Weather Service in Upton, New York.^[155]

Early plans

Bethlehem Engineering Corporation originally intended to build a 25-story office building on the Waldorf–Astoria site. The company's president, Floyd De L. Brown, paid $100,000 of the $1 million down payment required to start construction on the building, with the promise that the difference would be paid later.^[158] Brown borrowed $900,000 from a bank but defaulted on the loan.^[169][170]

After Brown was unable to secure additional funding,^[36] the land was resold to Empire State Inc., a group of wealthy investors that included Louis G. Kaufman, Ellis P. Earle, John J. Raskob, Coleman du Pont, and Pierre S. du Pont.^{[169][170][171]} The name came from the state nickname for New York.^[52][172] Alfred E. Smith, a former Governor of New York and U.S. presidential candidate whose 1928 campaign had been managed by Raskob,^[168][173] was appointed head of the company.^{[36][169][170]} The group also purchased nearby land so they would have the 2 acres (1 ha) needed for the base, with the combined plot measuring 425 feet (130 m) wide by 200 feet (61 m) long.^[172][174] The Empire State Inc. consortium was announced to the public in August 1929.^{[175][176][174]} Concurrently, Smith announced the construction of an 80-story building on the site, to be taller than any other buildings in existence.^[174][177]

Empire State Inc. contracted William F. Lamb, of architectural firm Shreve, Lamb and Harmon, to create the building design.^{[2][172][178]} Lamb produced the initial building design using the firm's earlier designs for the Reynolds Building in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, as the basis.^[52] He had also been inspired by Raymond Hood's design for the Daily News Building, which was being constructed at the same time.^[172] Concurrently, Lamb's partner Richmond Shreve created "bug diagrams" of the project requirements.^[179] The 1916 Zoning Act forced Lamb to design a structure that incorporated setbacks resulting in the lower floors being larger than the upper floors.^[d] Consequently, the building was conceived from the top down,^[180] giving it a pencil-like shape.^[39] The plans were devised within a budget of $50 million and a stipulation that the building be ready for occupancy within 18 months of the start of construction.^[36] Design drawings and construction were concurrent. Steel drawings were completed in mid-January 1930, when foundations were underway.^[181]

Design changes

The original plan of the building was 50 stories,^[42] but was later increased to 60 and then 80 stories.^[174] Height restrictions were placed on nearby buildings^[174] to ensure that the top fifty floors of the planned 80-story, 1,000-foot-tall (300 m) building^[31][182] would have unobstructed views of the city.^[174] The New York Times lauded the site's proximity to mass transit, with the Brooklyn–Manhattan Transit's 34th Street station and the Hudson and Manhattan Railroad's 33rd Street terminal one block away, as well as Penn Station two blocks away and Grand Central Terminal nine blocks away at its closest. It also praised the 3,000,000 square feet (280,000 m²) of proposed floor space near "one of the busiest sections in the world".^[174] The Empire State Building was to be a typical office building, but Raskob intended to build it "better and in a bigger way", according to architectural writer Donald J. Reynolds.^[168]

While plans for the Empire State Building were being finalized, an intense competition in New York for the title of "world's tallest building" was underway. 40 Wall Street (then the Bank of Manhattan Building) and the Chrysler Building in Manhattan both vied for this distinction and were already under construction when work began on the Empire State Building.^[31] The "Race into the Sky", as popular media called it at the time, was representative of the country's optimism in the 1920s, fueled by the building boom in major cities.^[183] The race was defined by at least five other proposals, although only the Empire State Building would survive the Wall Street Crash of 1929.^[36][g] The 40 Wall Street tower was revised, in April 1929, from 840 feet (260 m) to 925 feet (282 m) making it the world's tallest.^[185] The Chrysler Building added its 185-foot (56 m) steel tip to its roof in October 1929, thus bringing it to a height of 1,046 feet (319 m) and greatly exceeding the height of 40 Wall Street.^[31] The Chrysler Building's developer, Walter Chrysler, realized that his tower's height would exceed the Empire State Building's as well, having instructed his architect, William Van Alen, to change the Chrysler's original roof from a stubby Romanesque dome to a narrow steel spire.^[185] Raskob, wishing to have the Empire State Building be the world's tallest, reviewed the plans and had five floors added as well as a spire; however, the new floors would need to be set back because of projected wind pressure on the extension.^[186] On November 18, 1929, Smith acquired a lot at 27–31 West 33rd Street, adding 75 feet (23 m) to the width of the proposed office building's site.^[187][188] Two days later, Smith announced the updated plans for the skyscraper. The plans included an observation deck on the 86th-floor roof at a height of 1,050 feet (320 m), higher than the Chrysler's 71st-floor observation deck.^[186][189]

The 1,050-foot Empire State Building would only be 4 feet (1.2 m) taller than the Chrysler Building,^{[186][190][191]} and Raskob was afraid that Chrysler might try to "pull a trick like hiding a rod in the spire and then sticking it up at the last minute."^{[42][192][190]} The plans were revised one last time in December 1929, to include a 16-story, 200-foot (61 m) metal "crown" and an additional 222-foot (68 m) mooring mast intended for dirigibles. The roof height was now 1,250 feet (380 m), making it the tallest building in the world by far, even without the antenna.^{[193][42][194]} The addition of the dirigible station meant that another floor, the 86th, would have to be built below the crown;^[194] however, unlike the Chrysler's spire, the Empire State's mast would serve a practical purpose.^[192] A revised plan was announced to the public in late December 1929, just before the start of construction.^[36][165] The final plan was sketched within two hours, the night before the plan was supposed to be presented to the site's owners in January 1930.^[36] The New York Times reported that the spire was facing some "technical problems", but they were "no greater than might be expected under such a novel plan."^[37] By this time the blueprints for the building had gone through up to fifteen versions before they were approved.^{[42][195][196]} Lamb described the other specifications he was given for the final, approved plan:

The program was short enough—a fixed budget, no space more than 28 feet from window to corridor, as many stories of such space as possible, an exterior of limestone, and completion date of [May 1], 1931, which meant a year and six months from the beginning of sketches.^[84][42]

Hotel demolition

Demolition of the old Waldorf–Astoria began on October 1, 1929.^[202] Stripping the building down was an arduous process, as the hotel had been constructed using more rigid material than earlier buildings had been. Furthermore, the old hotel's granite, wood chips, and "'precious' metals such as lead, brass, and zinc" were not in high demand, resulting in issues with disposal.^[203] Most of the wood was deposited into a woodpile on nearby 30th Street or was burned in a swamp elsewhere. Much of the other materials that made up the old hotel, including the granite and bronze, were dumped into the Atlantic Ocean near Sandy Hook, New Jersey.^[204][205]

By the time the hotel's demolition started, Raskob had secured the required funding for the construction of the building.^[206] The plan was to start construction later that year but, on October 24, the New York Stock Exchange experienced the major and sudden Wall Street Crash, marking the beginning of the decade-long Great Depression. Despite the economic downturn, Raskob refused to cancel the project because of the progress that had been made up to that point.^[175] Neither Raskob, who had ceased speculation in the stock market the previous year, nor Smith, who had no stock investments, suffered financially in the crash.^[206] However, most of the investors were affected and as a result, in December 1929, Empire State Inc. obtained a $27.5 million loan from Metropolitan Life Insurance Company so construction could begin.^[207] The stock market crash resulted in no demand for new office space; Raskob and Smith nonetheless started construction,^[208] as canceling the project would have resulted in greater losses for the investors.^[175]

Steel structure

A structural steel contract was awarded on January 12, 1930,^[209] with excavation of the site beginning ten days later on January 22,^[210] before the old hotel had been completely demolished.^[211] Two twelve-hour shifts, consisting of 300 men each, worked continuously to dig the 55-foot (17 m) deep foundation.^[210] Small pier holes were sunk into the ground to house the concrete footings that would support the steelwork.^[181] Excavation was nearly complete by early March,^[212] and construction on the building itself started on March 17,^[213][2] with the builders placing the first steel columns on the completed footings before the rest of the footings had been finished.^[214] Around this time, Lamb held a press conference on the building plans. He described the reflective steel panels parallel to the windows, the large-block Indiana Limestone facade that was slightly more expensive than smaller bricks, and the building's vertical lines.^[193] Four colossal columns, intended for installation in the center of the building site, were delivered; they would support a combined 10,000,000 pounds (4,500,000 kg) when the building was finished.^[215]

The structural steel was pre-ordered and pre-fabricated in anticipation of a revision to the city's building code that would have allowed the Empire State Building's structural steel to carry 18,000 pounds per square inch (120,000 kPa), up from 16,000 pounds per square inch (110,000 kPa), thus reducing the amount of steel needed for the building. Although the 18,000-psi regulation had been safely enacted in other cities, Mayor Jimmy Walker did not sign the new codes into law until March 26, 1930, just before construction was due to commence.^[213][216] The first steel framework was installed on April 1, 1930.^[217] From there, construction proceeded at a rapid pace; during one stretch of 10 working days, the builders erected fourteen floors.^[218][2] This was made possible through precise coordination of the building's planning, as well as the mass production of common materials such as windows and spandrels.^[219] On one occasion, when a supplier could not provide timely delivery of dark Hauteville marble, Starrett switched to using Rose Famosa marble from a German quarry that was purchased specifically to provide the project with sufficient marble.^[181]

The scale of the project was massive, with trucks carrying "16,000 partition tiles, 5,000 bags of cement, 450 cubic yards [340 m³] of sand and 300 bags of lime" arriving at the construction site every day.^[220] There were also cafes and concession stands on five of the incomplete floors so workers did not have to descend to the ground level to eat lunch.^[3][221] Temporary water taps were also built so workers did not waste time buying water bottles from the ground level.^[3][222] Additionally, carts running on a small railway system transported materials from the basement storage^[3] to elevators that brought the carts to the desired floors where they would then be distributed throughout that level using another set of tracks.^{[220][85][221]} The 57,480 short tons (51,320 long tons) of steel ordered for the project was the largest-ever single order of steel at the time, comprising more steel than was ordered for the Chrysler Building and 40 Wall Street combined.^[223][224] According to historian John Tauranac, building materials were sourced from numerous, and distant, sources with "limestone from Indiana, steel girders from Pittsburgh, cement and mortar from upper New York State, marble from Italy, France, and England, wood from northern and Pacific Coast forests, [and] hardware from New England."^[218] The facade, too, used a variety of material—most prominently Indiana limestone but also architectural terracotta, brick,^[225] and black granite from Sweden.^[226]

By June 20, the skyscraper's supporting steel structure had risen to the 26th floor, and by July 27, half of the steel structure had been completed.^[220] Starrett Bros. and Eken endeavored to build one floor a day in order to speed up construction, achieving a pace of four and a half stories per week;^[227][106] prior to this, the fastest pace of construction for a building of similar height had been three and a half stories per week.^[227] While construction progressed, the final designs for the floors were being designed from the ground up (as opposed to the general design, which had been from the roof down). Some of the levels were still undergoing final approval, with several orders placed within an hour of a plan being finalized.^[227] On September 10, as steelwork was nearing completion, Smith laid the building's cornerstone during a ceremony attended by thousands. The stone contained a box with contemporary artifacts including the previous day's New York Times, a U.S. currency set containing all denominations of notes and coins minted in 1930, a history of the site and building, and photographs of the people involved in construction.^[228][229] The steel structure was topped out at 1,048 feet (319 m) on September 19, twelve days ahead of schedule and 23 weeks after the start of construction.^[230] Workers raised a flag atop the 86th floor to signify this milestone.^[227][231]

Completion and scale

Work on the building's interior and crowning mast commenced after the topping out.^[231] The mooring mast topped out on November 21, two months after the steelwork had been completed.^[229][232] Meanwhile, work on the walls and interior was progressing at a quick pace, with exterior walls built up to the 75th floor by the time steelwork had been built to the 95th floor.^[233] The majority of the facade was already finished by the middle of November.^[3] Because of the building's height, it was deemed infeasible to have many elevators or large elevator cabins, so the builders contracted with the Otis Elevator Company to make 66 cars that could speed at 1,200 feet per minute (366 m/min), which represented the largest-ever elevator order at the time.^[234]

In addition to the time constraint builders had, there were also space limitations because construction materials had to be delivered quickly, and trucks needed to drop off these materials without congesting traffic. This was solved by creating a temporary driveway for the trucks between 33rd and 34th Streets, and then storing the materials in the building's first floor and basements. Concrete mixers, brick hoppers, and stone hoists inside the building ensured that materials would be able to ascend quickly and without endangering or inconveniencing the public.^[233] At one point, over 200 trucks made material deliveries at the building site every day.^[3] A series of relay and erection derricks, placed on platforms erected near the building, lifted the steel from the trucks below and installed the beams at the appropriate locations.^[235] The Empire State Building was structurally completed on April 11, 1931, twelve days ahead of schedule and 410 days after construction commenced.^[3] Al Smith shot the final rivet, which was made of solid gold.^[236]

The project involved more than 3,500 workers at its peak,^[2] including 3,439 on a single day, August 14, 1930.^[237] Many of the workers were Irish and Italian immigrants,^[238] with a sizable minority of Mohawk ironworkers from the Kahnawake reserve near Montreal.^{[238][239][240]} According to official accounts, five workers died during the construction,^[241][242] although the New York Daily News gave reports of 14 deaths^[3] and a headline in the socialist magazine The New Masses spread unfounded rumors of up to 42 deaths.^[243][242] The Empire State Building cost $40,948,900 to build (equivalent to $661 million in 2023),^[6] including demolition of the Waldorf–Astoria. This was lower than the $60 million budgeted for construction.^[5]

Lewis Hine captured many photographs of the construction, documenting not only the work itself but also providing insight into the daily life of workers in that era.^{[210][244][245]} Hine's images were used extensively by the media to publish daily press releases.^[246] According to the writer Jim Rasenberger, Hine "climbed out onto the steel with the ironworkers and dangled from a derrick cable hundreds of feet above the city to capture, as no one ever had before (or has since), the dizzy work of building skyscrapers". In Rasenberger's words, Hine turned what might have been an assignment of "corporate flak" into "exhilarating art".^[247] These images were later organized into their own collection.^[248] Onlookers were enraptured by the sheer height at which the steelworkers operated. New York magazine wrote of the steelworkers: "Like little spiders they toiled, spinning a fabric of steel against the sky".^[235]

Tenants and tourism

At the beginning of 1931, Fifth Avenue was experiencing high demand for storefront space, with only 12 of 224 stores being unoccupied. The Empire State Building, along with 500 Fifth Avenue and 608 Fifth Avenue, were expected to add a combined 11 stores.^[259][260] The office space was less successful, as the Empire State Building's opening had coincided with the Great Depression in the United States.^[248] In the first year, only 23 percent of the available space was rented,^[261][262] as compared to the early 1920s, where the average building would be 52 percent occupied upon opening and 90 percent occupied within five years.^[263] The lack of renters led New Yorkers to deride the building as the "Empty State Building"^[248][264] or "Smith's Folly".^[130]

The earliest tenants in the Empire State Building were large companies, banks, and garment industries.^[130] Jack Brod, one of the building's longest resident tenants,^[265][266] co-established the Empire Diamond Corporation with his father in the building in mid-1931^[267] and rented space in the building until he died in 2008.^[267] Brod recalled that there were only about 20 tenants at the time of opening, including him,^[266] and that Al Smith was the only real tenant in the space above his seventh-floor offices.^[265] Generally, during the early 1930s, it was rare for more than a single office space to be rented in the building, despite Smith's and Raskob's aggressive marketing efforts in the newspapers and to anyone they knew.^[268] The building's lights were continuously left on, even in the unrented spaces, to give the impression of occupancy. This was exacerbated by competition from Rockefeller Center^[261] as well as from buildings on 42nd Street, which, when combined with the Empire State Building, resulted in surplus of office space in a slow market during the 1930s.^[269]

Aggressive marketing efforts served to reinforce the Empire State Building's status as the world's tallest.^[270] The observatory was advertised in local newspapers as well as on railroad tickets.^[271] The building became a popular tourist attraction, with one million people each paying one dollar to ride elevators to the observation decks in 1931.^[272] In its first year of operation, the observation deck made approximately $2 million in revenue, as much as its owners made in rent that year.^[261][248] By 1936, the observation deck was crowded on a daily basis, with food and drink available for purchase at the top,^[273] and by 1944 the building had received its five-millionth visitor.^[274] In 1931, NBC took up tenancy, leasing space on the 85th floor for radio broadcasts.^[275][139] From the outset the building was in debt, losing $1 million per year by 1935. Real estate developer Seymour Durst recalled that the building was so underused in 1936 that there was no elevator service above the 45th floor, as the building above the 41st floor was empty except for the NBC offices and the Raskob/Du Pont offices on the 81st floor.^[276]

Other events

Per the original plans, the Empire State Building's spire was intended to be an airship docking station. Raskob and Smith had proposed dirigible ticketing offices and passenger waiting rooms on the 86th floor, while the airships themselves would be tied to the spire at the equivalent of the building's 106th floor.^[132][133] An elevator would ferry passengers from the 86th to the 101st floor^[f] after they had checked in on the 86th floor,^[131] after which passengers would have climbed steep ladders to board the airship.^[132] The idea, however, was impractical and dangerous due to powerful updrafts caused by the building itself,^[278] the wind currents across Manhattan,^[132] and the spires of nearby skyscrapers.^[279] Furthermore, even if the airship were to successfully navigate all these obstacles, its crew would have to jettison some ballast by releasing water onto the streets below in order to maintain stability, and then tie the craft's nose to the spire with no mooring lines securing the tail end of the craft.^{[16][132][279]} On September 15, 1931, a small commercial United States Navy airship circled 25 times in 45-mile-per-hour (72 km/h) winds.^[280] The airship then attempted to dock at the mast, but its ballast spilled and the craft was rocked by unpredictable eddies.^[281][282] The near-disaster scuttled plans to turn the building's spire into an airship terminal, although one blimp did manage to make a single newspaper delivery afterward.^[36][132]

On July 28, 1945, a B-25 Mitchell bomber crashed into the north side of the Empire State Building, between the 79th and 80th floors.^[35] One engine completely penetrated the building and landed in a neighboring block, while the other engine and part of the landing gear plummeted down an elevator shaft. Fourteen people were killed in the incident,^[283][196] but the building escaped severe damage and was reopened two days later.^[283][284]

2000s

Following the destruction of the World Trade Center during the September 11 attacks, the Empire State Building again became the tallest building in New York City, but was only the second-tallest building in the Americas after the Sears (later Willis) Tower in Chicago.^{[310][330][331]} As a result of the attacks, transmissions from nearly all of the city's commercial television and FM radio stations were again broadcast from the Empire State Building.^[150] The attacks also led to an increase in security due to persistent terror threats against prominent sites in New York City.^[332]

In 2002, Trump and Yokoi sold their land claim to the Empire State Building Associates, now headed by Malkin, in a $57.5 million transaction.^[288][333] This action merged the building's title and lease for the first time in half a century.^[333] Despite the lingering threat posed by the 9/11 attacks, the Empire State Building remained popular with 3.5 million visitors to the observatories in 2004, compared to about 2.8 million in 2003.^[334]

Even though she maintained her ownership stake in the building until the post-consolidation IPO in October 2013, Leona Helmsley handed over day-to-day operations of the building in 2006 to Peter Malkin's company.^[288][335] In 2008, the building was temporarily "stolen" by the New York Daily News to show how easy it was to transfer the deed on a property, since city clerks were not required to validate the submitted information, as well as to help demonstrate how fraudulent deeds could be used to obtain large mortgages and then have individuals disappear with the money. The paperwork submitted to the city included the names of Fay Wray, the famous star of King Kong, and Willie Sutton, a notorious New York bank robber. The newspaper then transferred the deed back over to the legitimate owners, who at that time were Empire State Land Associates.^[336]

2010s to present

Starting in 2009, the building's public areas received a $550 million renovation, with improvements to the air conditioning and waterproofing, renovations to the observation deck and main lobby,^[96] and relocation of the gift shop to the 80th floor.^[337][338] About $120 million was spent on improving the energy efficiency of the building, with the goal of reducing energy emissions by 38% within five years.^[338][100] For example, all of the windows were refurbished onsite into film-coated "superwindows" which block heat but pass light.^{[100][339][340]} Air conditioning operating costs on hot days were reduced, saving $17 million of the project's capital cost immediately and partially funding some of the other retrofits.^[339] The Empire State Building won the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold for Existing Buildings rating in September 2011, as well as the World Federation of Great Towers' Excellence in Environment Award for 2010.^[340] For the LEED Gold certification, the building's energy reduction was considered, as was a large purchase of carbon offsets. Other factors included low-flow bathroom fixtures, green cleaning supplies, and use of recycled paper products.^[341]

On April 30, 2012, One World Trade Center topped out, surpassing the Empire State Building as the city's tallest skyscraper.^[331] By 2014, the building was owned by the Empire State Realty Trust (ESRT), with Anthony Malkin as chairman, CEO, and president.^[342] The ESRT was a public company, having begun trading publicly on the New York Stock Exchange the previous year.^[343] In August 2016, the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) was issued new fully diluted shares equivalent to 9.9% of the trust; this investment gave them partial ownership of the entirety of the ESRT's portfolio, and as a result, partial ownership of the Empire State Building.^[344] The trust's president John Kessler called it an "endorsement of the company's irreplaceable assets".^[345] The investment has been described by the real-estate magazine The Real Deal as "an unusual move for a sovereign wealth fund", as these funds typically buy direct stakes in buildings rather than real estate companies.^[346] Other foreign entities that have a stake in the ESRT include investors from Norway, Japan, and Australia.^[345]

A renovation of the Empire State Building was commenced in the 2010s to further improve energy efficiency, public areas, and amenities.^[1] In August 2018, to improve the flow of visitor traffic, the main visitor's entrance was shifted to 20 West 34th Street as part of a major renovation of the observatory lobby.^[347] The new lobby includes several technological features, including large LED panels, digital ticket kiosks in nine languages, and a two-story architectural model of the building surrounded by two metal staircases.^[1][347] The first phase of the renovation, completed in 2019, features an updated exterior lighting system and digital hosts.^[347] The new lobby also features free Wi-Fi provided for those waiting.^[1][348] A 10,000-square-foot (930 m²) exhibit with nine galleries opened in July 2019.^[349][350] The 102nd floor observatory, the third phase of the redesign, reopened to the public on October 12, 2019.^{[113][114][116]} That portion of the project included outfitting the space with floor-to-ceiling glass windows and a brand-new glass elevator.^[351] The final portion of the renovations to be completed was a new observatory on the 80th floor, which opened on December 2, 2019.^[115][105] In total, the renovation cost $160 million^[116] or $165 million and took four years to finish.^[115][105]

A comprehensive restoration of the building's mooring and antenna masts also began in June 2019. Antennas on the mooring mast were removed or relocated to the upper mast, while the aluminum panels were cleaned and coated with silver paint.^{[352][353][354]} To minimize disruption to the observation decks, the restoration work took place at night. The project was completed by late 2020.^[354]