Daily News Building

A black and white photograph of a skyscraper taken from street level a few blocks away. The facade of the building is made up of thin alternating bands of light and dark. The bands are continuous, running from the lower portion of the building all the way to the top. There is no ornament at the top of the building; the bands end where the building does. The building is a large slab, similar to the proportions of a cereal box, and only has a few, very small setbacks.

Nyholm & Lincoln
Daily News Building, 1930
The Print Collector/Heritage Images
© Heritage Image Partnership Ltd.

The Daily News Building was designed to house the paper’s administrative offices as well as all of the equipment and infrastructure necessary to print and distribute the paper.

Because of New York zoning laws enacted in 1916, the tower could fill only a maximum of twenty five percent of the lot size. With the printing press areas on lower floors that occupied a majority of the lot, Hood and Howells were free to build a sheer cliff of a tower. The setbacks were minimal and the tower stood as a slab rising from a three-story stone base.

Hood opted for an unornamented jazz-age moderne style. The exterior design consists of an unbroken pattern of vertical bands of white glazed brick that continues all the way to the roof, and from edge to edge. Slim vertical windows and dark brick spandrels are placed between them.