Lipstick Building

The Lipstick Building stands at 885 Third Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, completed in 1986 to a design by the architect John Burgee working with Philip Johnson. Its rounded, elliptical footprint and three telescoping setbacks as the tower rises gave the building its popular nickname, a distinctly postmodern departure from the rectilinear glass towers that dominated New York office construction in the preceding decades. Clad in bands of red granite and stainless steel alternating with ribbon windows, it became one of the most recognizable examples of postmodern commercial architecture in the city. The building later drew wider public attention as the location of the investment firm run by Bernie Madoff, whose fraud was uncovered from offices on its upper floors.