Olympic Tower

641 5th Avenue | also 645 5th Avenue, 3 East 51st Street | Midtown | built 1973

Open on the map10 entries

Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.

  1. 1947

    Best & Co. opens a 12-story department store on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 51st Street

    Before the tower, the corner held the Union Club and two residences, which had been cleared by 1944 when a store for Best & Co. was announced. The 12-story Best & Co. building opened in 1947. Its owners later found the site worth more as a development parcel than as a store, which set up the construction of Olympic Tower.

    Source: Wikipedia

  2. 1970

    Morris Lapidus proposes an L-shaped, 40-story tower with a sky plaza and art gallery

    Architect Morris Lapidus, who recalled begging Arlen Realty for the job for two years, was given one week to produce a design for the Best's site. He proposed an L-shaped, 40-story building whose lower half was a granite slab, topped by a glass cube meant to hold executive apartments and offices along with a sky plaza and an art gallery that filled an entire floor. Plans also called for an atrium between 51st and 52nd Streets.

    Source: Wikipedia

  3. 1970

    Aristotle Onassis's family trust and Arlen Realty team up to replace Best & Co. with a tower

    In March 1970 Aristotle Onassis set up a family trust, Victory Development, which formed a joint venture with Arlen Realty to buy the Best & Co. flagship and neighboring properties. Morris Lapidus was hired to draw the first scheme, an L-shaped tower. That October the store's parent company decided to liquidate Best's and close every branch, including the one on this corner.

    Source: Wikipedia

  4. 1971

    September

    Skidmore, Owings & Merrill replaces Morris Lapidus as designer under the new Fifth Avenue zoning district

    A special Fifth Avenue zoning district took effect in April 1971, rewarding retail at street level and mixed uses above. City planners then pushed the developers to rethink Lapidus's design, and Jacqueline Onassis reportedly objected to his involvement; Kahn & Jacobs was also let go. In September 1971 Mayor Lindsay announced that SOM would design the building, which became the first tower built under the new rules.

    Source: Wikipedia

  5. 1974

    September 6

    Olympic Tower is dedicated, with condominiums priced for a mostly foreign market

    Dedication ceremonies took place on September 6, 1974, and the project had cost about $95 million. The developers sold its condominiums mainly to buyers outside the United States, with brochures printed in several languages, and by 1975 foreign owners held roughly 80 percent of the units. Apartments had been priced from $40,000 for a studio to $650,000 for a nine-room duplex.

    Source: Wikipedia

  6. 1976

    Adnan Khashoggi buys a duplex penthouse and keeps it until 1993

    The billionaire Adnan Khashoggi owned a penthouse duplex in the tower from 1976 to 1993. The top two floors hold four duplexes with the building's only fireplaces, and his had a private swimming pool, a ballroom, a sauna, indoor gardens, five bedrooms, six bathrooms and a catering kitchen sized for 300. Until 2012 his former residence was home to the actress Anne Hathaway and Raffaello Follieri, then her partner.

    “Billionaire Adnan Khashoggi owned a penthouse duplex from 1976 to 1993.”

    Source: Wikipedia

  7. 1978

    February

    Halston opens a mirrored 21st-floor showroom in Olympic Tower

    Halston's headquarters on the 21st floor took nine months to build and officially opened in February 1978. The 12,000-square-foot space had mirrored walls, 18-foot ceilings, a frosted glass ceiling and dark-red carpet with an H motif. Seats at his shows there were in hot demand, and Martha Graham, Liza Minnelli, Andy Warhol and Steve Rubell sat in the front row.

    Source: archive.pinupmagazine.org

  8. 1979

    City Planning threatens to revoke the occupancy certificate because the public atrium has no shops

    Five years after opening, none of the retail space had been rented and the atrium sat mostly empty. City Planning Commission chairman Robert F. Wagner Jr. warned in 1979 that the owners had broken their promise to fill the mall with stores in return for zoning bonuses. The owners responded by opening a newsstand, public restrooms and restaurant space, and the atrium was fully rented by August 1982.

    Source: Wikipedia

  9. 1998

    The National Basketball Association moves its headquarters into the tower

    The NBA has been based at Olympic Tower since 1998, occupying floors 11 through 20 with a lease running through 2035. Richemont's North American arm followed in 2001 on floors three through nine. Among earlier occupants, Halston used the entire 21st floor as his showroom and workrooms until 1984, and the financier Adnan Khashoggi held a duplex penthouse between 1976 and 1993.

    Source: Wikipedia

  10. 2019

    January

    A renovated atrium reopens with wall sculptures by Liam Gillick and a new cafe

    Oxford Properties hired MdeAS Architects to rework the two-story atrium that connects 51st and 52nd Streets, and the refurbished space reopened in January 2019. The project added Liam Gillick's Triangulated Passage Work, five sculptural panels set into the walls, along with a cafe and a green wall of five plant types. The atrium's lighting now changes through the day to follow daily rhythms.

    Source: Wikipedia

Further reading

Nearby

All 178 buildings with stories in Midtown