200 Vesey Street, formerly known as Three World Financial Center and also known as the American Express Tower, is one of four towers that comprise the Brookfield Place complex in the

Battery Park City Battery Park City is a mainly residential planned community and neighborhood on the west side of the southern tip of the island of Manhattan in New York City. It is bounded by the Hudson River on the west, the Hudson River shoreline on the nor ...

, directly adjacent to the

Financial District A financial district is usually a central area in a city where financial services firms such as banks, insurance companies, and other related finance corporations have their headquarters offices. In major cities, financial districts often host ...

Lower Manhattan Lower Manhattan, also known as Downtown Manhattan or Downtown New York City, is the southernmost part of the Boroughs of New York City, New York City borough of Manhattan. The neighborhood is History of New York City, the historical birthplace o ...

New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...

. Rising 51 floors and , it is situated between the

Hudson River The Hudson River, historically the North River, is a river that flows from north to south largely through eastern New York (state), New York state. It originates in the Adirondack Mountains at Henderson Lake (New York), Henderson Lake in the ...

and the World Trade Center. The building opened in 1986 as part of the World Financial Center and was designed by Haines Lundberg Waehler and Cesar Pelli & Associates.

Description

The building is an example of

postmodern architecture Postmodern architecture is a style or movement which emerged in the 1960s as a reaction against the austerity, formality, and lack of variety of modern architecture, particularly in the International Style (architecture), international style adv ...

, as designed by

Cesar Pelli Cesar or César may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''César'' (film), a 1936 French romantic drama * ''César'' (play), a play by Marcel Pagnolt Places * Cesar, Portugal * Cesar Department, Colombia * Cesar River, in Colombia * Cesar ...

& Associates, and contains over 2.1 million square feet (195,000 m²) of rentable office area. It connects to the rest of the World Financial Center complex through a courtyard leading to the

Winter Garden A winter garden is a kind of garden maintained in wintertime. History The origin of the winter garden dates back to the 17th to 19th centuries where European nobility constructed large conservatories that housed tropical and subtropical pla ...

, a dramatic glass-and-steel public space with a 120 ft (37 m) vaulted ceiling under which there is an assortment of trees and plants, including sixteen 40 ft (12 m) palm trees from the

Mojave Desert The Mojave Desert (; ; ) is a desert in the rain shadow of the southern Sierra Nevada mountains and Transverse Ranges in the Southwestern United States. Named for the Indigenous peoples of the Americas, indigenous Mohave people, it is located pr ...

. Pelli used the building's basic aesthetic again for the

One Canada Square One Canada Square is a skyscraper in Canary Wharf, London. It is the third tallest building in the United Kingdom at above ground level,Aviation charts issued by the Civil Aviation Authority and contains 50 storeys. It achieved the title of ...

tower in London's

Canary Wharf Canary Wharf is a financial area of London, England, located in the Isle of Dogs in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The Greater London Authority defines it as part of London's central business district, alongside Central London. Alongside ...

development. Canary Wharf was, like the World Financial Center, a project by Canadian developers Olympia & York, and One Canada Square was designed by the same principal architect. One Canada Square differs from 200 Vesey Street in that it is clad with a

stainless steel Stainless steel, also known as inox, corrosion-resistant steel (CRES), or rustless steel, is an iron-based alloy that contains chromium, making it resistant to rust and corrosion. Stainless steel's resistance to corrosion comes from its chromi ...

curtain wall instead of stone. Due to its status as the tallest tower in the complex, the building was subject to scathing criticism at the time of its construction. In 1985, the New York Times published an article lambasting the tower. ‟Not too long ago, it was possible to gaze all the way from mid-Manhattan to the skies over the harbor. Now, that vista has been pierced by the American Express tower being built in the World Financial Center at Battery Park City. At the moment, the skyscraper resembles a gigantic, upended, rectilinear fish skeleton. As construction proceeds, however, and the floors fill in, there will be a solid wall where there was once a generous slice of sky." NYC - 200 Liberty Street - Winter Garden - 200 Vesey Street - Goldman Sachs World Headquarters - panoramio

NYC - 200 Liberty Street - Winter Garden - 200 Vesey Street - Goldman Sachs World Headquarters - panoramio

Three World Financial Center was severely damaged by the falling debris when the World Trade Center towers collapsed on

September 11, 2001 The September 11 attacks, also known as 9/11, were four coordinated Islamist terrorist suicide attacks by al-Qaeda against the United States in 2001. Nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercial airliners, crashing the first two into ...

. The building's southeast corner took heavy structural damage, though the effects were not enough to create a threat of collapse. The building had to be closed for repairs from September 11, 2001 until May 2002 as a result of damage sustained in the terrorist attacks. A memorial was constructed to honor the 11 employees of American Express who were victims of the September 11 attacks, it is named the Eleven Tears Memorial. 3 World Financial Center is today the world headquarters of

American Express American Express Company or Amex is an American bank holding company and multinational financial services corporation that specializes in payment card industry, payment cards. It is headquartered at 200 Vesey Street, also known as American Expr ...

, and was once World Headquarters of

Lehman Brothers Lehman Brothers Inc. ( ) was an American global financial services firm founded in 1850. Before filing for bankruptcy in 2008, Lehman was the fourth-largest investment bank in the United States (behind Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and Merril ...

Holdings Inc. It was renamed 200 Vesey Street when the rest of the complex became Brookfield Place in 2014.

References

External links

Official website
*
Skyscraperpage - Three World Financial Center
* () {{American Express 1986 establishments in New York City Office buildings completed in 1986 Skyscraper office buildings in Manhattan American Express Lehman Brothers Brookfield Place (New York City) Brookfield Properties buildings Battery Park City West Side Highway

Description

See also

References

External links