Edgar J. Kaufmann Conference Center
The conference center was announced in 1962, during the construction of the Institute of International Education (IIE)'s headquarters, and was dedicated in December 1964.
After the building was sold in 1998 to a group backed by Japanese financiers, there were several unsuccessful attempts to preserve the conference center as a New York City designated landmark.
Aalto, working with his wife Elissa, designed various pieces of furniture within the conference center, which were largely manufactured in Finland.
The conference hall is on the 12th floor of 809 United Nations Plaza, originally the headquarters of the Institute of International Education (IIE), at First Avenue and 45th Street in the Turtle Bay neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City.
[4][5] The Kaufmann Conference Center, along with the Woodberry Poetry Room at Harvard University, are the only interior spaces in the U.S. designed by Aalto.
[6] Before the Kaufmann Conference Center was completed, Aalto's only other work in the U.S. (excluding demolished buildings[7]) was Baker House at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
[11] The wall of the 12th-story elevator lobby contains dark blue tiles on a cement-plaster background, which are laid in a vertical pattern.
[12] The eastern wall, which overlooks the headquarters of the United Nations, is made of glass and contains a grille to reduce glare.
[19] There are vase-shaped shades, gold-plated chandeliers, upright lamps, and molded door handles made of bronze.
The light passes through a metal filter at the bottom of each chandelier; according to Aalto, it took half a year to design this feature.
[7] When Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. was elected as a trustee to the Institute of International Education in 1961, the IIE was considering constructing a building on First Avenue between 45th and 46th Streets at a cost of $4.5 million.
[8][23] Harrison, Abramovitz & Harris collaborated with Aalto in the design of the conference center, since the project involved structural modifications to the IIE building.
[16][7] Upon the center's completion, architectural critic Ada Louise Huxtable wrote that the 12th floor had been "transformed for an undisclosed and probably formidable price into the most beautiful and distinguished interior that New York has seen in many years.
"[15][16] In 1998, the IIE sold the building to Foundation for the Support of the United Nations (FSUN), a group backed by Japanese financiers.
The agency's rules mandated that interior landmarks had to be public spaces, but the Kaufmann Conference Center could only be accessed by invitation.
[25] The LPC convinced FSUN to temporarily refrain from selling off the conference center until the commission could hold a hearing on the rooms.
[6] In late 2015, the LPC again hosted a public hearing on whether to designate the Kaufmann Conference Center as an interior landmark.
