Art Deco architecture flourished in New York City during the 1920s and 1930s. The style broke with many traditional architectural conventions and was characterized by verticality, ornamentation, and building materials such as plastics, metals, and terra cotta. Art Deco is found in government edifices, commercial projects, and residential buildings in all five boroughs. The architecture of the period was influenced by worldwide decorative arts trends, the rise of mechanization, and New York City's 1916 Zoning Resolution, which favored the setback feature in many buildings.

The exuberant economy of the Roaring Twenties and commercial speculation spurred a citywide building boom. The size and sophistication of Art Deco ranged from towering skyscrapers to modest middle-class housing and municipal buildings. Colorful, lavishly-decorated skyscrapers came to dominate the skyline of Manhattan before the Great Depression ended their construction. The Depression and changing tastes pushed the style to more subdued applications as it spread in the 1930s, becoming a style of choice for infrastructure projects and modern middle-class apartments in the outer boroughs.

A lull in construction during World War II and the rise of the International Style led to the end of new Art Deco in the city. After falling out of favor and suffering from neglect during the city's downturn in the latter half of the 20th century, the city's Art Deco has been reappraised. Among New York's most treasured and recognizable skyscrapers are the Art Deco Empire State and Chrysler buildings. Art Deco skyscrapers formed the core of the city's skyline for decades and influence modern construction. Many of these buildings are protected by historic preservation laws, while others have been lost to new development or neglect.

American Art Deco has its origins in European arts, especially the style moderne popularized at the 1925 International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts in Paris, from which Art Deco draws its name (Exposition internationale des arts décoratifs et industriels modernes). While the United States did not officially participate, Americans—including New York City architect Irwin Chanin^[1]: 55—visited the exposition,^[2]: 47 and the US government also sent a delegation. Their resulting reports helped spread the style to America.^[3]: 6 Other influences included German expressionism, the Austrian Secession, Art Nouveau, cubism, and the ornament of African, Central American, and South American cultures.^{[1]: 8–9 [4]: 4} American Art Deco architecture would assume different forms across the country, influenced by local culture, laws, and tastes.^[2]: 42

Art Deco came into style just as New York City was being rapidly transformed. An exploding population, flush economic times, cheap credit, and lax zoning combined to encourage a building boom. The real estate market was so frenetic that buildings that had stood for just a few years were regularly torn down for newer construction.^[5]: 42 New, larger buildings replaced multiple smaller structures on old lots. The amount of office space in New York City increased by 92% in the late 1920s.^{[5]: 49–50}

Zoning regulations had major impacts on the design of buildings. The proliferation of ever-larger skyscrapers like the 40-story Equitable Building spurred New York City's passage of the US's first citywide zoning code, the 1916 Zoning Resolution.^[6] The regulations, intended to prevent tall buildings from cutting off light and air at street level, required buildings to "set back" from street level depending on the width of the street and the zoned area.^[7] After a building rose up and set back to cover 25 percent of the lot, the total height was unrestricted.^[5]: 48 The impact of the new regulations did not materialize until later in the decade, as American entry into World War I slowed construction.^[7]

Early buildings built to conform to the new codes did so unimaginatively—the Heckscher Building in Midtown (completed 1921) set back evenly like a stack of boxes as it rose—but more inspired interpretations of the law followed.^[7] A major influence on the resulting skyscrapers was Eliel Saarinen's second-place design entry for Chicago's Tribune Tower, considered a new style distinct from earlier Gothic or Classical architecture.^[2]: 7–8 Also influential were architect and illustrator Hugh Ferriss' series of speculative architectural illustrations exploring how to make buildings that met the zoning requirements.^{[4]: 4 [7][8]} Ferriss' illustrations envisioned buildings as sculptural forms rather than simple boxes. Architect Talbot Hamlin described Ferriss' work as "a magic wand to set the American city architecture free from its nightmare [...] No longer was the high building apparently built by the mile and cut off to order, but it was composed break upon break, buttress on buttress. The possibilities of poetry entered in."^{[5]: 48–49}

Precursors to the Art Deco skyscrapers that soon went up across the city were buildings such as Raymond Hood's American Radiator Building (1924), which was neo-Gothic in general style but featured abstract ornament that would characterize Art Deco.^[9] Another early transitional building was the Madison Belmont Building at 181 Madison Avenue (1924–1925), which featured traditional ornamentation and organization on upper floors, combined with Art Deco motifs on the lower floors. The Art Deco ironwork was provided by Edgar Brandt, who contributed the entrance gates to the 1925 Paris Exhibition.^{[3]: 1, 5–6} One of the first Art Deco skyscrapers was the New York Telephone Company Building, built between 1923–1927 and designed by Ralph Thomas Walker. Its muted color and ornament did not fully demonstrate the style that soon flourished across the city, but its massing and verticality were thoroughly modern and broke with established architectural styles.^{[10][11][4]: 34–5}

The buildings that would later be described as Art Deco shared common elements. The setback laws resulted in sculptural buildings with long, uninterrupted piers rising between columns of windows and decorated spandrels.^{[4]: 4 [12]: 70} These choices were made to emphasize the height of the buildings,^[2]: 37 a choice mimicked even on much shorter buildings built across town. New York's architects were at the forefront of using new materials, including synthetics like Bakelite and Formica plastics, as well as Nirosta, a corrosion-resistant steel alloy that made exterior metal on skyscrapers more feasible.^{[4]: 5 [2]: 68} Where stainless steel was too expensive to use, aluminum's declining price and lighter weight made it a common choice for interior and exterior usage.^[13]: 26 Other favored materials were multicolored terra cotta, limestone, and glass brick.^{[4]: 5 [14]: 92–3} Even when traditional building materials were used—marble, wood, brick, bronze—they were combined in novel ways, intending to shock and delight.^[14]: 92

Architectural historian Rosemarie Haag Bletter described the most pronounced element of Art Deco as its use of "sumptuous ornament".^[2]: 37 The most dynamic elements were reserved for entrances and at the tops of buildings, with multiple materials combined to form dazzling colors or rich textures. Sometimes the buildings were shaded—using darker-colored materials at the base, and then gradually lightening towards the top—to increase the building's visibility.^{[2]: 37 [14]: 84} Art Deco buildings in the city were also richly appointed inside and out with reliefs, mosaics, murals, and other art.^[1]: 1–8 Allegorical depictions—such as beehives of industry on the French Building, personifications of virtues at Rockefeller Center, or figures portraying industry and the arts at the International Magazine Building—were common decorative elements.^{[1]: 47, 72} The entries and lobbies of these skyscrapers often drew direct influence from the painted sets and stages of theaters, with framing like hanging curtains.^[2]: 10 Elaborate ironwork blended with decorative frosted or etched glass.^[14]: 105

Art Deco in New York became intrinsically linked with commercial architecture. Its focus on rich ornamentation appealed to commercial patrons who wanted an "acceptable" modern style. These developers in turn gave architects a permissive mandate to create in the style, as long as the end result was not too shocking.^{[2]: 40–43} The buildings rose to the height where the cost of added space equalized with the commercial value of that space.^[2]: 13 The emerging style was contemporaneously called the "vertical style", "skyscraper style", or simply "modern", with the characteristic look of setback buildings leading to them being called "wedding cake" buildings.^{[4]: vi, 4 [12]: 79 [16]: 164} Architect Ely Jacques Kahn commented in 1926 on the emerging style that his brethren were creating with their buildings:

[It] is so characteristic of New York that it would be more logical, by far, to call it a New York Style. [...] Decoration becomes a far more precious thing than a collection of dead leaves, swags, bull's heads and cartouches. It becomes a means of enriching the surface with a play of light and shade, voices and solids. [Today's ornamental forms] respond to the bulk and simplicity of the skyscraper itself.^[4]: 27

The demand for modern buildings was such that even architectural firms known for more restrained and classical designs adopted the new style. Cross & Cross's main practice was for discreet townhomes and banks, but in the late 1920s they produced modern skyscrapers such as the RCA Victor Building. The 50-story skyscraper turned Gothic tracery into stylized lightning bolts.^[17] Another conservative firm that moved to modernistic designs was Walker & Gillette, whose best-known Art Deco building in New York is the Fuller Building.^[4]: 32 Buildings already being constructed were sometimes appended with Art Deco flourishes; the Paramount Building (1926) had an Art Deco clock tower appended to a Beaux-Arts base.^[2]: 22B These buildings were constructed either as headquarters for established and emerging companies, or else speculative projects where the money would be drawn from renting out the space in the new building.

The design of speculative buildings was chiefly driven by maximizing rentable space, whereas corporate buildings served as advertisements for the corporations themselves—spending money not for direct financial gain, but what architect Timothy L. Pflueger termed "special architectural appeal".^{[18]: 162–163} Even with these corporate projects, however, the owners often lent space to smaller businesses and treated them as real estate investments.^{[18]: 162–163} The look of the buildings often echoed the business conducted there; the RCA Victor Building's wave motifs represent the power of radio, while the Chrysler Building had ornamental touches of radiators and hubcaps representing the automobile company.^[4]: 5 The McGraw-Hill Building,^[1]: 61 New Yorker Hotel, and Daily News Building feature their names in prominent signage or embedded into the facade. Because the true shape of the building was often hard to grasp for a street-level observer, many skyscrapers featured miniature versions of themselves as part of their ground-level decoration.^{[19]: 37 [4]: 22 [20]}

In the Financial District and downtown Manhattan, the skyline was quickly transformed by the proliferation of Art Deco high-rises.^[4]: 6 The New York Telephone Company Building was decorated with motifs derived from Aztec designs, and the lobby featured a vaulting ceiling with frescoes detailing the history of communication.^[1]: 111 Other notable Art Deco skyscrapers in downtown include the Irving Trust Company Building (1929–1931), designed with a "curtain" exterior and Hildreth Meiere-produced mosaics in the interior;^{[1]: 99–102} 120 Wall Street (1929–1930), with a wedding-cake form and a red granite and limestone base;^[21]: 71 and the City Bank-Farmers Trust Building (1930–1931), featuring abstract heads along the facade looking down at street level, and bronzed doors featuring transportation methods.^{[1]: 106–109} The final skyscraper built before World War II in the Financial District was 70 Pine Street, completed in 1932.^[1]: 102 It featured unique double-deck elevators servicing two lobby floors, designed to maximize the profitable space of the small plot.^{[4]: 21–22 [20]}

In comparison to downtown, which already had skyscrapers dating to the previous century and fewer available plots, Midtown Manhattan was only just beginning to develop its skyline as Art Deco became popular. Its business district was booming after the construction of Grand Central Terminal and the undergrounding of train tracks opening up new plots for development. 42nd Street became Midtown's major Art Deco thoroughfare, hosting some of the city's most famous skyscrapers.^[4]: 75 One of the earliest was the Chanin Building (1927–1929), headquarters for the Chanin Construction Company. It featured buttresses evocative of miniature skyscrapers on the exterior, along with abstract floral reliefs on the lower floors. Inside, the lobby included bronze grills that laud the economic opportunity of the city.^{[4]: 84–5}

New York's architects were caught in a furious race for the title of tallest building in the world, and several Art Deco buildings vied for the title. By the end of 1930 more than 11 building plans had more than 60 floors; among them were the Chrysler Building and the Empire State Building, both of which increased in height from earlier drafts.^[22] In competition with 40 Wall Street for the title of the tallest building, architect William Van Alen secretly constructed the Chrysler Building's 185-foot (56 m) steel spire within the building itself, hoisting it and securing it into position in a single day, claiming the title of the tallest building.^[4]: 82 The triumph was short-lived; a month later former governor and businessman Al Smith updated the plans for the Empire State Building,^[23] adding more stories and a 200-foot spire of its own.^[24][25]

The Chrysler Building's spire went up just one day before the October 1929 Wall Street Crash that triggered the economic turmoil of the Great Depression. The immediate impact of the Depression was a reduction in building of all kinds; one architectural firm went from 17 filed plans for buildings up to 30 stories in 1929 to just three plans in 1930, the tallest being four stories.^[26] The scope of some existing construction was also downsized; the Metropolitan Life Company intended to capture the title for tallest building with the Metropolitan Life North Building, but construction stopped during the downturn and never resumed, leaving it an "enormous stump" of 31 stories instead of the planned hundred.^{[4]: 56–7} In the shadow of the deepening Depression, the Metropolitan Opera abandoned its plans to move to a new three-block complex financed by John D. Rockefeller Jr. Rockefeller decided to proceed with the construction of Rockefeller Center, hiring three different architectural firms. The architects envisioned a plan for buildings arranged on several axes, clad in the same materials. At the center was 30 Rockefeller Plaza.^{[4]: 111–12} The Rockefellers earmarked $150,000 ($2,736,000 adjusted for inflation) for art in the plaza alone, filling the space with paintings, reliefs, and sculptural forms.^[1]: 16 The decorative features focus on the achievements of humankind, mythology, and stories of education and commerce.^{[1]: 18, 33}

A 1932 Museum of Modern Art architecture exhibit introduced the International Style to New Yorkers.^[5]: 77 Where Art Deco favored ornamentation, International Style favored undecorated facades; Bletter summed up International Style as "less is more", and Art Deco as "more than enough."^{[2]: 41–42, 71–73} International Style buildings, with their emphasis on airy glass and the horizontal,^[18]: 180 were now modern and exciting, while Art Deco became seen as outmoded and linked to the tough times of the Depression.^[4]: 7–8 The International Style and modernism replaced Art Deco as it fell out of favor during and after World War II;^{[5]: 77 [52]} many smaller commercial buildings remodeled to fit the newest tastes.^[14]: 131

Art Deco's role as the first international style, and its importance, were largely forgotten for decades.^[2]: 4 Art Deco was not reappraised and formally named and categorized until the 1960s.^[4]: 7–8 Writing in 1975, Cervin Robinson noted that by the standard of direct stylistic influence, Art Deco had virtually no impact on contemporary buildings—but by its impact on the character of New York itself, Art Deco "helped crystallize our image of Gotham."^[2]: 4 The style has inspired 21st-century construction in the city using Deco design details or building materials.^[53][54]

The downturn in New York City's fortunes in the latter half of the 20th century caused the damage and loss of many Art Deco buildings.^[37]: 61 Smaller commercial buildings and theaters were often completely lost, while by the 1970s few Deco skyscrapers still had intact lobbies.^[14]: 2 Horace Ginsbern's Noonan Plaza Apartments on the Grand Concourse suffered from heavy vandalism, with skylights ripped from frames to sell for scrap metal. It was eventually restored in the 1980s thanks to the efforts of Ginsbern's son and a new owner.^{[4]: 203 [55]} The desirability of Art Deco objects has led buildings to be stripped of their ornamentation to be resold piecemeal.^[19]: 9

The modern historical preservation movement in New York City was sparked by the loss of the old Penn Station in the 1960s, leading to the empowering of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission to protect historic buildings.^[56] Don Vlack considered the fact that no Art Deco buildings had been landmarked by 1974 an example of the lingering bias against the style.^[14]: 2 Some of the first Art Deco buildings protected were the Chrysler Building and Chanin Building in 1978. Some building owners fought some or all of the designation; General Electric successfully fought the interior landmark designation for the RCA Victory Building,^[57] and Radio City Music Hall's interiors were landmarked only after a contentious battle with the Music Hall's owners, who wished to demolish it. The Landmarks Commission received more than 100,000 signatures urging the landmark status.^[58][59]

Some Art Deco buildings were demolished before they were eligible for protection. For example, Donald Trump demolished the 12-story Bonwit Teller building at Fifth Avenue and 57th Street in 1980; the limestone reliefs Trump had promised to the Metropolitan Museum of Art were instead jackhammered and destroyed.^[60] Other Art Deco losses, such as the New Market Building in the South Street Seaport, were surrounded by landmarked districts but were not old enough to be initially included, and had landmarked status later denied.^[61] To avoid landmark status, landowners will sometimes rush to demolish the building or deface the facade.^[62] Given that interiors and exteriors of buildings are landmarked separately, even landmarked buildings can see their unique Deco features lost—such as the McGraw-Hill Building, whose unique streamlined metal and enamel lobby was destroyed in a 2021 renovation.^[63]

Groups such as the Art Deco Society of New York (ADSNY) produce talks and tours about the city's architecture,^[64] as well as advocating for the preservation of the city's remaining Deco.^[65] New York City Landmarks Commission veteran Anthony W. Robins wrote that decades after the rise and fall of Art Deco, the style "survives and flourishes" in New York. The once-daring buildings have become city historic landmarks,^[4]: 8 and new building projects draw influence from the style.^[66]

Below is a partial listing of city-landmarked Art Deco buildings within New York City. Items marked with a dagger (†) are also (or alternatively) listed on the National Register of Historic Places, those with a double dagger (‡) have landmarked interiors, and those with a section sign (§) are National Historic Landmarks.

• List of Art Deco architecture in New York (state)