John Hancock Tower

The John Hancock Tower, also called Hancock Place, The Hancock Tower, or The Hancock, is a 60-story, 790-foot (241 m) skyscraper in Boston. It was named for the John Hancock Insurance company. The tower was designed by Henry N. Cobb and was completed in 1976. Pei Cobb Freed & Partners Retrieved 2010-04-20 It has been the tallest building in Boston for more than 30 years. It is also the tallest building in New England.

Its street address is 200 Clarendon Street. At first, John Hancock Insurance primarily used the building, but after 2004, some offices moved to a new building.

Architecture
The John Hancock Tower was designed in 1972. It is a glass monolith. It was made in the minimalist and the modernist skyscraper design.

The largest panes of glass possible were used. There are no spandrel panels, and very few mullions. The floor plan has a parallelogram shape. The window glass is tinted slightly blue.

Characteristics

History
The tower has an observation deck that was a famous attraction. However, the observation deck was closed after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

In 2006, Broadway Partners bought Hancock Place for $1.3 billion.  By 2009, they had defaulted on the loans they used to buy the building, and it was forclosed. On March 30, 2009, Hancock Place was sold at auction for $660 million to a consortium of "Normandy Real Estate Partners" and "Five Mile Capital Partners". In October 2010, Boston Properties bought the John Hancock Tower for $930 million.


The Hancock Tower was built by "John Hancock Insurance".

Notes

References
Oct. 15, 1973. "Those Window Pains" , TIME.
Harl P. Aldrich, James R. Lambrechts (Fall 1986). "Back Bay Boston, Part II: Groundwater Levels ", Civil Engineering Practice, Volume 1, Number 2.

Related pages

John Hancock, for whom John Hancock Insurance was named
Prudential Tower for an image of the Boston skyline from Cambridge in 1963, with the old 26-story Hancock building a conspicuous landmark.

Other websites

library-towers John Hancock Tower
Architecture Week  When Bad Things Happen to Good Buildings
The Perfect Skyscraper The Perfect Skyscraper
Special Report on the Boston Globe; "The Hancock at 30" includes 4 audio slideshows
Globe Critic, Robert Campbell, on the problems of the John Hancock Tower
So, what should we call the John Hancock Tower now? (photos of construction)

Category:Buildings and structures in Boston
Category:Skyscrapers in the United States
Category:I. M. Pei buildings
Category:1969 establishments in the United States
Category:1960s establishments in Massachusetts