Philip Johnson (1906–2005) and John Burgee, in their partnership during the 1960s–1990s, designed 1001 Fifth Avenue (1979) — a 24-story Fifth Avenue limestone cooperative directly across from the Metropolitan Museum that represents one of the most architecturally controversial post-1960 commissions on the avenue. The building's neo-Beaux-Arts facade, executed in modern construction methods, was an attempt to mediate between the McKim Mead & White-era 998 Fifth Avenue to its immediate north and the broader Fifth Avenue prewar context, and it produced significant critical debate at completion. Johnson's broader portfolio includes the Glass House (1949), the Seagram Building (with Mies van der Rohe, 1958), the AT&T Building (1984), and significant collaborations through his Museum of Modern Art curatorship; Burgee's design partnership with Johnson produced much of the firm's commercial portfolio.
Biography