JP Morgan Chase’s 270 Park Avenue Opens, Six Years and $4B Later

J.P. Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said Tuesday the bank’s new headquarters at 270 Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan cost about $4 billion to build. That would be roughly $1 billion more than previously reported estimates.

Whatever the final price tag, the 60-story tower — which Dimon and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul officially opened on Tuesday — certainly puts an exclamation point at the end of the New York office market’s pandemic recovery. 

The bronze-clad office building designed by renowned architect Norman Foster has been in the works since demolition on the original structure began in 2019, and will be occupied primarily by J.P. Morgan Chase. It was built with a grandeur intended to make it a desirable destination for employees five days a week. Gensler designed the workspaces and the amenities.

“[The board of directors] actually listened to us walk in one day and say, ‘We got this idea — we’re going to tear down an office tower, go 400 feet below ground, and build a new one on top. We have to buy air rights. It’s going to take six years and cost $4 billion,’ but they said O.K.,” Dimon said in remarks at the opening. “I think for all of us, it was a labor of love. It was a little scary because we’re not used to [building projects]. We move paper and money, we’re not used to it.”

It’s unclear how much of the building J.P. Morgan will occupy and how much will be leased to other tenants. But retail spaces will be filled by 19 restaurant concepts approved by Danny Meyer, coffee shops, a gym, and a pub known as Morgan’s, according to the Wall Street Journal.

J.P. Morgan Chase did not immediately respond to a request to clarify the tower’s cost. (Were the tower to have overrun estimates by $1 billion or so, it would be in some august company: Ken Griffin recently said that the new Miami headquarters for his Citadel financial empire was $1.5 billion more expensive than anticipated.)

The bank expects 270 Park to be occupied by 10,000 people on a regular workday by the end of 2025.

Hochul saw the design of the building between East 47th and East 48th streets, just two blocks north of Grand Central Terminal, as an example that could be followed in the public sector as well. She told Foster in her remarks that he should offer his services in the redevelopment of Pennsylvania Station, a project that is now being managed by the federal government.

“If you have time afterward, maybe we can walk down to Penn Station. Just saying, the president said he would pay for everything,” Hochul said. “They can make a new ballroom in the White House, why not make this magnificent?”

Foster was also the mind behind another major Park Avenue tower that opened post-pandemic: L&L Holding, Tokyu Land Corporation and BGO’s 425 Park Avenue, which opened in October 2022.

The knighted British architect spoke passionately about the virtues of Park Avenue at the time.

Mark Hallum can be reached at mhallum@commercialobserver.com.