The Ford Foundation, chartered by Henry and Edsel Ford in 1936, is a private foundation providing grants focused on strengthening democratic values, community and economic development, education, media, arts and culture, and human rights. In addition to the Ford Foundation Headquarters on 43rd Street in New York City, the Foundation currently has twelve international field offices. In the early 1960’s the Ford Foundation sought to erect a permanent corporate headquarters in New York City that reflected the humanitarian beliefs the Foundation extolled. Kevin Roche John Dinkeloo and Associates (KRJDA) was a relatively new firm in 1963 when they were approached to design the structure. Previously both Roche and Dinkeloo had worked for Eero Saarinen and Associates. Both the Ford Foundation and Saarineen and Associates had at one time been based in Michigan prior to 1960. Saarinen died in 1961 leaving Roche and Dinkeloo to finish such major projects as the TWA terminal at JFK International Airport for the original firm before founding KRJDA. Saarineen had believed in thoroughly researching a project and that there was always, “a unique solution for a unique problem” both traits which were firmly routed in the new firm. The location and needs of the Ford Foundation Headquarters presented two challenges: a unique terrain and desire to interact with the community outside the Foundation, and a desire to build a sense of community within the organization. At the time the Ford Foundation employed over 400 workers in over a dozen divisions. The Foundation wanted a suitable, spacious environment for its employees without building beyond its needs. The area immediately surrounding the future site in Tudor City abutted a small park on the east and an adjoining pre-war high-rise residential complex to the west. Roche created six models with various forms suited to the space, ranging from a low large footprint building with windows lining the exterior, to a 16-story slender tower with a plaza on the park side. The final design was carefully suited to conform to the existing street line and surroundings. Roche said later of the Foundations acceptance of his design, “They liked it because it wasn’t another office building. They liked it because it was a special identity. They liked it because we weren’t relating to 42nd Street. And they liked it because its intent was to create a community.”The design was unveiled in 1964, immediately gaining critical praise. Ada Louise Huxtable of the New York times called it “an object lesson in the possibilities opened by fresh thought and a creative approach to the city’s most important commercial building problem: the provision of ample and impressive headquarters for large corporations or equivalent organizations, in structures that have some civic conscience as well.” The building was erected with few alterations to the final design scheme. Huxtable went on to describe the building as an “original, highly romantic beauty” just prior to the project’s completion in 1967. Additionally the New Yorker in a Talk of the Town article of the same year called the design, “an altogether new kind of urban environment.” The Architectural Record agreed it was a “new kind of urban space.” However the building also had its detractors, Vincent Scully among them. Architectural review argued the Ford Foundation Headquarters was “another instance of the firm’s preoccupation with the simplified structural statement leading to a kind of gigantism in architecture.”

Ford Foundation Headquarters

Well maintained. Since completion the building-management department at the Foundation has worked to maintain the building in close to original condition. The interior offices retain their original footprints with much of the original furniture remaining, including mahogany desks, wall-mounted bookshelves, cabinetry, and overhead hanging light fixtures. The exterior materials were chosen to age in place and the patina the steel facing has developed is in keeping with the tonality of the granite, which shows discoloration at street level.

The Ford Foundation was innovative in a multitude of ways, the most prominent of these being the creation of a large interior courtyard, a new kind of urban environment. The plan also prominently featured 45-degree angles, as in the stairway, creating a strong diagonal orientation within a square footprint, a development that occupied many architects in the following decade. The courtyard contains orderly mullions and spandrels interrupted by the massive columns, stairwell walls and suspension members, creating an assorted structural composition. The “lozenge style” skylight is composed of i-beam trusses securing glazing in three alternating bands, massive in scale yet still giving the appearance of faceted glasswork. The mortarless joints of the granite faced columns imitate piled-stone, complimenting the earthly garden below. As with the interior granite the exterior materials were also chosen to compliment, not impersonate, the foliage and surrounding environment. The design of the building was extremely detail oriented, every aspect carefully planned, from roof rainwater collection to irrigate the interior garden, laying heating rods under the sidewalks for ice prevention, and design of movable office furniture that could accommodate a variety of needs. Every aspect of the building was designed to emphasize community, enhance efficiency, and lend a note of seriousness to the business being conducted inside.

Both the architects and client aspired to create a building with a humanistic view of the workplace. The intention was to build both a corporate headquarters and civic monument that would be a contribution to the city, much as the Ford Foundation sought to contribute to the advancement of society through grants. Two issues were addressed with the introduction of the interior garden. privacy for workers while maintaining a sense of community, and the erection of an innovative building symbolic of the era without encroaching on the already well-established neighborhood. Though the design approach was effective in addressing the specific challenges of the site, it did not catch on as a common building typology in urban settings until later.

The massive scale of the building components was characteristic of KRDJA’s early work. The Ford Foundation was an early innovator in urban public spaces, much copied in building lobbies and shopping malls, though rarely to such massive scale. The orderliness and detailed execution of every aspect of the building along with the massive height and scale of the inner courtyard were also characteristic of modernism’s new approach to architecture.

The Ford Foundation, from the unveiling of its original plans in 1964 to its completion in 1967 received largely positive critical acclaim. While it was praised by contemporaries for its innovative approach to urban space, it never gained the iconic status or attention of other ground breaking modernist buildings in New York such as Lever House or the Seagram Building. The Ford Foundation was one of the first buildings to execute the environmental trends of the period through the inclusion of green space and abundance of natural light and irrigation. The building itself uses less space then the zoning at the time allowed, an anomaly at the time. Largely ignored in the decades after its completion the building is now being recognized for its innovative environmental approach. In the 1990’s the building experienced a resurgence, receiving the Architects Twenty-five Year Award and Landmark status from the city of New York.

The Ford Foundation was representative of the Modern Movement’s new approach to urban environments. Yet the environmental sensitivity of the project was decades ahead of its time and can be considered one of the first green buildings, not just for the foliage but the systems. The careful efforts of the Ford Foundation to maintain the building in near original condition is a testament to the success of the original design.