Prudential Tower
- Architect
- Charles Luckman
- Year
- 1964
- City
- Boston, MA
The Prudential Tower rises 749 feet across 52 floors in Boston's Back Bay, built for Prudential Insurance and completed in 1964 to a design by Charles Luckman and Associates in the International Style. It remains the second-tallest building in Boston, behind only the John Hancock Tower, and anchors the larger Prudential Center complex.
the building
A radio mast on top. The tower's 749-foot roof height isn't the full story—its broadcast mast pushes the true pinnacle to 907 feet, and the building holds 1.2 million square feet of commercial and retail space below.
the style
The Prudential Tower was built in the International Style.
significance
When it was completed in 1964, the Prudential Tower was the tenth-tallest building in the world and the tallest in North America. Its construction was also linked to a notable literary event: in December 1963, poet Arthur Crew Inman died by suicide, reportedly driven in part by the construction noise outside his apartment, which led to the discovery of what was then believed to be the longest diary ever written by an American.
nearby
- Four Seasons Hotel & Private Residences, One Dalton Street
- Boston Public Library, McKim Building
- Old South Church
- Union Church
- Copley Plaza Hotel (interior/exterior)
- Oliver Ames Mansion