The Towers of the Waldorf Astoria New York

The Waldorf Astoria spent eight years closed. When it reopened in 2025, the 1931 Art Deco landmark had been turned partly inside out: a smaller, restored hotel up front and, above it, 372 private residences carved into Manhattan’s most famous address.

Project Scope

Skidmore, Owings & Merrill led the restoration of the full-block, landmarked building on Park Avenue, a job that ran to roughly $2 billion in construction alone. The work touched almost everything. Crews replaced about 5,400 windows, rebuilt the elevator systems, and painstakingly conserved the 1930s murals, mosaics, and metalwork that give the interiors their status. The hotel now occupies floors seven through fifteen with around 375 rooms; the residences sit on floor nineteen and up, with interiors by Jean-Louis Deniot and hotel spaces by Pierre-Yves Rochon. Pricing starts near $1.875 million and climbs into the tens of millions.

Why It Matters

Converting a working landmark hotel into luxury condominiums is one of the hardest jobs in construction. You’re threading new mechanical, structural, and life-safety systems through a building that can’t be substantially altered, under a preservation commission watching every change. The Waldorf shows the model can pencil out when the address carries enough value to justify it. That same calculus, spending heavily to keep a landmark name alive, runs through Midtown’s wider rebuild, including JPMorgan’s new headquarters at 270 Park Avenue a few blocks away.

Project Team & Details