Construction is nearing completion on 665 Fifth Avenue, the 28-story US headquarters for Rolex in Midtown, Manhattan. Designed by David Chipperfield Architects and developed by the Rolex Realty Company, the 469-foot-tall structure will yield 199,000 square feet of office and retail space for the world-famous watchmaker. Adamson Associates is the architect of record for the project, which is located at the corner of Fifth Avenue and East 53rd Street.
The pleated glass curtain wall has enclosed the building up to its crown since our last update in early April, when crews had just started to hang the first sections. The tower crane was also dismantled, and all that remains to finish are the ground floor, a portion of the northern-facing podium, and the gap where the hoist remains attached.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
665 Fifth Avenue. Photo by Michael Young.
Retail space will span the first four floors, followed by office space on levels five through 25. A double-height dining and event space with an adjoining terrace will occupy the final two stories, and a 50-foot-tall mechanical bulkhead caps the structure. A small rear yard is also present at the southeast corner of the property.
665 Fifth Avenue. Designed by David Chipperfield Architects.
665 Fifth Avenue. Designed by David Chipperfield Architects
The nearest subways from the ground-up development are the B, D, F, and M trains at the 47-50th Streets–Rockefeller Center station along Sixth Avenue, as well as the E and M trains at the 5th Avenue–53rd Street station to the east.
665 Fifth Avenue is engineered to achieve LEED Platinum certification and has an anticipated completion date of December 2025, as noted on site. YIMBY expects work to finish sometime within the first half of 2026.
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Will it be occupied in 5 to 7 years as AI takes over.
Commercial space demand will crash in 5 years. If you think there is an oversupply now just wait. 45% of white collar jobs will disappear. Can always be converted .,
Banks holding commercial mortgages may crash too.
I think AI will help as efficiencies and improved accuracy will free up the time people spend to do other things. I don’t see a world where these many millions of jobs will simply be lost. I don’t want to be caught in the middle of it, but I think we will find things to do. That said, this site is really about development.
This building is interesting because so much of the facade has a 1950s quality to it when facing it directly, but the setbacks and added corners adds a little more to the design. It’s still kind of dull, but the showroom may be great once it’s open and the office space is new and in a good location so it should be a success.
Hope all the scaffolding and blockades are gone in time for Christmas.
It’s about time.
Appropriate to have an update on the Rolex building, on a day when we adjust our artificial creation of time.
How cleverly timed for today for them to post this 😂
One of the last paeans to excess in this cycle?
The buildings next to this one make me wish all of Fifth Avenue had been landmarked. What a street that would be.
Want offices? Build them on Eighth, Ninth and Tenth.
I’m not familiar with average timelines, but this seems rather fast!
The drawing indicates a double skin glass, so the angled pleat is void with an inner standard flat window. I wonder if this will become a maintenance problem with dust and water vapor. Looking up at the triangular ledges inside the void is more perplexing than interesting. Overall, the building is nothing exceptional, but it’s not bad either.
The coming private finance and AI bubble bursts will kill far more jobs than AI, which will then finish off even more jobs and the middle class. Only low paid, manual jobs will be left. Then we’ll have a new type of housing crisis.
Agreed given the likely very high cost of that facade I think the resulting effect is woefully disappointing. Not giving Rolex energy for me at all.
This tower is a huge improvement over its predecessor! Very attractive, especially in person.
If AI is a successful for eliminating jobs It will increase the wealth of the top 1% who buys Rolex watches and they could turn the whole building into retail to sell their watches (just an exaggeration).
Driving crosstown in the 40’s, on a sunny day a few months ago, I looked up Fith Avenue to to that glaring, bright white, almost solid elevation of the Rolex building’s southern elevation, it looked quite out of place on the avenue.
Couldn’t agree more. These monstrous blank walls are beyond an eyesore.
Looking at the design of the building from above, it resembles square gears in the movement of a watch. Pretty cool!
Huge improvement from the Rolex building that existed before.
Would be nice If zoning encouraged / allowed for NOT FLAT rooftops.
also is this really the venue for AI speculation.
With every advancement in technology, Humans have always found new jobs we didnt even know existed.
Wasn’t this bldg supposed to feature some sort of glowing red sphere?