Socony-Mobil Building, International Style skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan, United States
The Socony-Mobil Building is a slender skyscraper with a gleaming stainless steel exterior that dominates the midtown skyline. Its facade consists of over 7,000 embossed steel panels paired with blue glass sections at the base, creating a uniformly textured and highly reflective surface.
Completed in 1956 by Harrison & Abramovitz, it was the first skyscraper in the world with a complete stainless steel exterior wall. This pioneering construction set new standards for postwar corporate architecture and transformed how companies approached tall building design.
The name comes from the Socony-Mobil oil company, which took half the building when it opened and stayed until the structure was renamed the Mobil Building in 1966. The block's earlier life shows in the subway entrance kept within the new building: it leads to the 7 and <7> trains and was the only preexisting structure preserved on the site.
The building sits at 150 East 42nd Street between Lexington and Third Avenues, making it easily accessible by public transportation from anywhere in the city. You can view and photograph its facade from street level without needing to enter the building itself.
The building's 3,200 single-pane windows pivot vertically and were engineered to withstand wind gusts of up to 145 miles per hour (233 km/h). The subway entrance inside the block, east of the 42nd Street archway, leads to the 7 and <7> trains and was the only preexisting structure kept when the tower went up.
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