Five Mid-Century Modern Office Buildings That Still Steal the Show
The 1950s and 60s weren’t just about suburban ranch houses—corporate America wanted headquarters that screamed “We’ve arrived, and we brought the future with us.” These five MCM office icons did exactly that, and they’re still turning heads in 2025.
1. CBS Building (Black Rock) – New York City, 1965
Architect: Eero Saarinen (completed by Kevin Roche & John Dinkeloo) The only skyscraper Saarinen ever designed, this 38-story dark-granite triangle looks like a giant, brooding Mies van der Rohe tribute. No logos, no setbacks, just relentless verticality and those signature triangular columns. Nicknamed “Black Rock” the day it opened, it made every other Madison Avenue tower look frumpy overnight. Fun fact: the ground-floor lobby still has the original Philip Johnson–designed benches.
2. John Deere West Office Building – Moline, Illinois, 1964
Architect: Eero Saarinen (again) Saarinen took Cor-Ten steel (the stuff that rusts on purpose) and turned a farm-equipment HQ into sculpture. Floating above a reflecting pool, with exposed weathered beams and floor-to-ceiling glass, it’s basically a love letter to the prairie. Kevin Roche finished it after Saarinen’s death, and it won the AIA Twenty-five Year Award—twice.
3. One Shell Square – New Orleans, 1970
Architect: Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (Louis Skidmore & Fazlur Khan) At 697 feet, it was the tallest building in the South when it opened. The travertine-clad lobby feels like walking into a 1970s Bond villain lair, complete with 50-foot ceilings and a suspended Alexander Calder mobile. The tapered form and bronze-tinted windows still make the CBD skyline look like a sci-fi paperback cover.
4. Transamerica Pyramid – San Francisco, 1972
Architect: William Pereira Technically late MCM, but come on—those flared wings, that aluminum spire piercing the fog? It’s the ultimate corporate middle finger to gravity. Hated by critics in ’72, beloved by everyone else now. Bonus: the top-floor “virtual observatory” livestream is still the best free view in the city.
5. Gropius & TAC’s Pan Am Building (now MetLife) – New York City, 1963
Architects: Walter Gropius, Pietro Belluschi, and Emery Roth & Sons Love it or hate it, this 59-story octagon parked right on top of Grand Central changed Manhattan forever. The brutalist waffle-slab facade, the rooftop heliport (RIP), and the way it blocks Park Avenue views—it’s pure 1960s hubris. Inside, the original marble lobby and Saul LeWitt murals are miraculously intact.
Honorable Mentions (because one list is never enough)
Connecticut General Life (now Cognizant) – Bloomfield, CT, 1957 – SOM’s campus masterpiece with a 400-foot glass atrium.
PepsiCo World Headquarters – Purchase, NY, 1970 – Edward Durell Stone’s seven low pavilions in a Donald Judd sculpture garden.
Richards Medical Research Laboratories – Philadelphia, 1965 – Louis Kahn’s brick towers that look like medieval labs on stilts.
Why They Still Matter
These weren’t just offices—they were corporate cathedrals built to outlast empires. Most have dodged the wrecking ball, earned landmark status, and now house tech giants who pay premium rent for that authentic 1960s swagger. Walk into any of them and the air still smells faintly of cigarettes, ambition, and Aqua Net.
Next time you’re in town, skip the tourist traps and go stare up at Black Rock or sneak a lobby photo at John Deere. Mid-century offices weren’t designed to be likable—they were designed to be unforgettable. Mission accomplished.