Two World Financial Center
225 Liberty Street | also 2 World Financial Center | Battery Park City | built 1987
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The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1980
Paul Reichmann's Olympia & York wins the right to build the World Financial Center
In 1980 Olympia & York, the family firm run by Paul Reichmann and his brothers Albert and Ralph, won the right to build the World Financial Center, whose second tower is now 225 Liberty Street. The company closed its construction sites on the Jewish Sabbath and religious holidays. By 1990 the Reichmanns held roughly 8 percent of the city's commercial office space, over twice the Rockefellers' share.
Source: Internet Archive
- 1987
The 44-story tower fronts West Street and opens onto the Winter Garden courtyard
Rising 645 feet, the tower holds more than 2.4 million square feet of rentable office space. Its most prominent facade faces West Street, while a courtyard leads from the building to the Winter Garden. That public space, built of glass and steel, has a vaulted ceiling 120 feet high and sixteen palm trees brought from the Mojave Desert.
“It connects to the rest of the World Financial Center complex through a courtyard leading to the Winter Garden…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 1987
Haines Lundberg Waehler and Cesar Pelli complete Two World Financial Center
The 44-story, 645-foot postmodern tower is completed in 1987 as part of the World Financial Center in Battery Park City, at a cost of $800 million. Its main facade faces West Street, and it later houses tenants including BNY Mellon and the College Board. The tower is renamed 225 Liberty Street in 2014, when the complex becomes Brookfield Place.
Source: Wikipedia
- 2001
FDNY's Peter Ganci sets up a command post by the tower and shelters in its garage on September 11
After the North Tower was hit at 8:46 a.m., FDNY's Peter Ganci established a command post at a ramp into the garage beneath Two World Financial Center, on the far side of the West Side Highway from the tower. When the South Tower collapsed at 9:59, he and others sheltered in the garage basement. He then ordered a new post set up farther north, returned to the North Tower, and was killed when it fell at 10:28.
“…set up a command post on a ramp leading to the underground garage under 2 World Financial Center, directly across the West Side Highway from the North Tower…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 2001
Falling debris from the Twin Towers severely damages the building
Debris from the collapsing World Trade Center towers severely damages the building on September 11, along with its neighbors in the World Financial Center. Repairs keep the tower closed until May 2002.
Source: Wikipedia
- 2003
Thacher Proffitt & Wood, which lost its offices at 2 World Trade Center, moves into the tower
The law firm traced its roots to 1848 and had occupied floors 38 through 40 of 2 World Trade Center before the attacks. All of its employees survived. After a spell in midtown Manhattan, it moved into 2 World Financial Center in September 2003.
“…before moving to 2 World Financial Center in September 2003…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 2008
Thacher Proffitt & Wood, which moved in five years earlier, announces it is dissolving
The firm had helped build the mortgage-backed securities market, and its documents were known on trading desks as Thacher docs. After Bear Stearns, its largest client, collapsed in 2008, the firm breached its loan covenants, and about 100 lawyers left for another firm on December 21. Two days later its management announced the firm would dissolve.
Source: Wikipedia
- 2014
Two World Financial Center becomes 225 Liberty Street as the complex is renamed Brookfield Place
Brookfield rebranded the whole complex in 2014, which is when the renaming came. By then the 44-story tower housed Dotdash Meredith, the College Board and BNY Mellon, along with Hudson's Bay Company, Commerzbank, Fiserv, Oppenheimer Funds and State Street, among others.
Source: Wikipedia
- 2015
BNY Mellon moves its headquarters into the tower
In October 2015 the Bank of New York Mellon relocated its American and global headquarters to 225 Liberty Street, because its former headquarters at 1 Wall Street had been sold the year before. The stay was brief: in July 2018 the company moved again, to 240 Greenwich Street.
Source: Wikipedia
Further reading
- 225 Liberty StreetWikipedia
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