The original tower was designed by architects Raymond Hood and John Mead Howells in the Art Deco style, and it was erected between 1928 and 1930.

The Daily News Building consists of a 36-story tower that is 476 feet (145 m) tall, as well as two shorter additions extending east to Second Avenue.

[13][18] Hood stated that the window design was largely chosen based on its perceived utility, because the interior space would have needed to be easily divided into offices.

Above these storefronts are bronze friezes, which are overlaid at specific intervals by the bottom portions of the white brick walls that are present on the upper stories.

[37] Under this ceiling in a stepped pit[38] is a rotating globe that was for many years the world's largest, conceived by the Daily News as a permanent educational science exhibit.

[9][23][36][43] The walls have nineteen panels designed by J. Henry Weber, which depict maps, weather charts, and clocks from different time zones.

[48] The main lobby was so popular among tourists that Hood subsequently opened up a side entrance for Daily News employees.

The printing plant's fourth story was originally occupied by the Museum of the Peaceful Arts and was reserved for the Daily News's future use.

The eighth story of the printing plant contained the newspaper's executive offices, as well as its accounting, personnel, purchasing, and stock departments.

[18] The Medill family published numerous large newspapers in the United States in the early 20th century, including the Tribune Media conglomerate.

[61][62][63] Eleven days later, the Daily News bought the lots at 41st Street and Second Avenue, which collectively comprised 8,000 square feet (740 m2).

[18] One of Hood's plans, which would have set back the tower above the third story to create a rising effect, was rejected by Patterson since it would have eliminated usable office space allowed under the zoning restrictions.

In February 1929, the Daily News and the Board of Education each agreed to cede 25 feet (7.6 m) toward a pedestrian walkway, protecting views from the building's western facade.

[88][89] The New Yorker observed that the office space at the Daily News Building was designed "at factory prices", which was part of the reason why Patterson had selected Hood as an architect.

[118] In 1984, the Daily News removed its printing presses from the building, freeing up 175,000 square feet (16,300 m2) that was converted to office space.

[118] The Daily News continued to reduce the amount of space it occupied during the early 1990s;[119] the building only housed the paper's business offices and newsrooms, as production and distribution had been relocated to New Jersey.

[121][122] The relocation was motivated by the cost of maintaining several spaces, as well as the fact that the lease was about to expire and the Daily News's operations in the building had been downsized since the early 1980s.

[129] SL Green Realty announced in December 2002 that it had won the right to buy the Daily News Building,[133] and the company finalized its purchase the next year for $265 million.

[134] At the time of SL Green's purchase, the building was 100 percent occupied; its tenants included not only the Tribune's affiliates and Omnicom, but also Verizon Communications, Value Line, Neuberger Berman, and the United Nations Population Fund.

[143] SL Green sold a 49 percent ownership stake in the building to Meritz Alternative Investment Management in July 2021 for $790 million.

[144][145] The building houses the former Daily News TV broadcast subsidiary WPIX, channel 11, which later became an affiliate of The CW network.

[151] Other tenants include the United Nations Development Programme;[152] UN Women, which occupies 85,000 square feet (7,900 m2);[153] and the New York office of public relations firm FleishmanHillard.

[157] In 1931, the Daily News published an editorial in rebuttal to modern architecture, saying that the design was focused on the "efficient production of newspapers.

[157][160] According to English architect Frank Scarlett, who looked at the model of the building, it was one of several contemporary designs that deviated from the eclectic style that had been popular until the early 20th century.

[91] One early appraisal of the Daily News Building called the facade "almost nothing but a series of stripes",[21][26][28] which the reviewer deemed to be artistic.

Architectural historian Henry-Russell Hitchcock and architect Philip Johnson perceived the building's design to have sacrificed functionality for effectiveness, saying that the "crisp square termination" on the roof "is a deception".

[172] Further reviews in the 1970s described the building as having deviated from popular architectural styles of the time,[173] and being a modern skyscraper that was easily distinguishable from "mediocre metal-and-glass neighbors".

[23] Architectural writer Eric Nash said in 1999 that "Hood did not romanticize the skyscraper as a carved mountain", unlike contemporaries such as Ralph Thomas Walker or Hugh Ferriss.

[175] Justin Davidson of New York magazine wrote in 2017 that Hood had "produced an artistic creation, a jazzy concoction of syncopated setbacks and white-brick stripes shooting toward the sky.

[184] During the blackout, film crews lent their Klieg lights to Daily News editors so that the following day's issue could be published.