The office building in Midtown was designed by architect Kevin Roche and John Dinkeloo in 1963 and completed in 1968 on the former site of the Hospital for Special Surgery. Its large tree-filled atrium was the first of its kind in Manhattan, and it is widely credited as setting the precedent for indoor public spaces in Manhattan office buildings. The mass of the building is a large L-shaped office block wrapped around a spacious winter garden, forming a near-perfect square. The resulting block of office space opens onto either the atrium or the street, depriving only a small number of workers of exterior views. The placement of the atrium in that location is surprisingly clever. In addition to maximizing sunlight for the plants, the cut reflects the location of the adjacent park in Tudor City, which slopes down through the envelope of the building, rolling down into a fountain at the center of the space.
The Ford Foundation is a globally oriented private foundation with the mission of advancing human welfare. Created in 1936 by Edsel and Henry Ford, it was originally funded by a gift from Edsel Ford. After the death of the two founders, the foundation owned 90 percent of the non-voting shares of the Ford Motor Company. The foundation has since sold its FMC holdings and now plays no role in the automobile company. The foundation was the largest, and one of the most influential foundations in the world, with global reach and special interests in economic empowerment, education, human rights, democracy, the creative arts, and Third World development. Its grants support projects that focus on reducing poverty and injustice; promoting democratic values; and advancing human knowledge, creativity and achievement.
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