Metropolitan Life North Building

The Metropolitan Life North Building is an Art-deco skyscraper designed in 1929 by Harvey Wiley Corbett, and built between 1930 and 1950 in New York, NY.

Metropolitan Life North Building is not the only name you might know this building by though. It is common for companies to want to attach their names to iconic buildings when they move in, or for the general public to come up with nicknames, and this one is no exception. The Metropolitan Life North Building is also known, or has been known as, Eleven Madison Avenue, Metropolitan Life North Annex, or 25 Madison Avenue.

Its precise street address is 11-25 Madison Avenue, New York, NY. You can also find it on the map here.

The building has been restored 4 times over the years to ensure its conservation and adaptation to the pass of time. The main restoration works happened in 1932, 1940, 1950 and 1997.

Harvey Wiley Corbett was the architecture firm in charge of the architectural design. But there was also one other architect involved, as far as we know. We are talking about Dan Everett Waid.

That being said, architecture is a complex discipline involving many professionals from different fields, without whom this building would have not been possible. We will surely be leaving out a lot of names here, but here is a list of the people we do know also played their part in making the Metropolitan Life North Building a reality:

• Starrett Brothers & Eken as the Main Contractor
• Edward Trumbull, D.Putnam Brinley, Nicholas Pavloff, NC Wyeth, and Griffith Bailey Coale as the collaborating Artist

The Metropolitan Life North Building can be categorized as an Art-deco building.

The Metropolitan Life North Building was completed in 1950, significantly after what could be considered the end of the Art-Deco movement. It was clearly inspired by the movement, but because it doesen't really fit into the movement's timeline it would be considered as a post-movement or neo-movement.

Especially during modern times, there are less imposed rules when it comes to design. Variety and experimentation are welcome, and architects are given the freedom to take inspiration from a wide range of sources.

Looking at the past for inspiration can be a great starting point for an architectural project, and something which Harvey Wiley Corbett clearly took advantage of to design the Metropolitan Life North Building. Architects may choose to look to the past for multiple reasons. It could be that they want the building to merge with an older surounding, give it the feeling of having been there for longer than it actualy has, personal preference or it might even be a requieremnt from the client.

The Metropolitan Life North Building uses a frame structure made of steel columns and concrete slabs.

A frame structure uses a combination of beams and columns to sustain the building's weight. The walls in this case are non-load bearing, which allows for more flexibility when distributing the interior spaces.

The facade is a non-load bearing masonry facade. This type of facade became common during the period when buildings, especially taller ones, transitioned from load-bearing wall systems to frame structures.

Frame structures allowed facades to be independent from the building's frame, enabling the use of lighter materials and larger openings. However, it took some time for architects to incorporate these new posibilities into their designs, and so for a while they simply replicated the look and feel fo buildings people where used to seeing.

From an aesthetic point of view, the facade features details of marble and Alabama limestone ornaments.

Other materials found at the Metropolitan Life North Building include, bronze, used for most of the window frames, Tennessee pink marble, seen in decoratives elements and the lobby floor, aluminum , found within the coffered ceiling of the vestibule, plaster, used in ceilings and moldings, and acustic tiles, which were used in the offices ceilings to improve the acoustic comfort.