Street to the southeast; and the CBS Studio Building, Park Avenue Plaza, and Racquet and Tennis Club Building across 53rd Street to the south. The Banco Santander building on 53rd Street also abuts Lever House. An entrance to the New York City Subway's Fifth Avenue/53rd Street station, served by the , is less than a block west along 53rd Street. During the early 19th century, the site of Lever House was part of a farm, which was developed later in that century with four- and five-story row houses. By the late 19th century, the Park Avenue railroad line ran in an open-cut in the middle of Park Avenue. The line was covered with the construction of Grand Central Terminal in the early 20th century, spurring development in the surrounding area, Terminal City. The adjacent stretch of Park Avenue became a wealthy neighborhood with upscale apartments. On Lever House's site, there were twenty-two rowhouses on 53rd and 54th Streets, owned by Robert Walton Goelet. Twenty of these were demolished in 1936 and replaced by the Art Deco Normandie theater and a one-story "taxpayer" structure, while two rowhouses remained at 62 and 64 East 54th Street. Architecture Lever House was designed by Gordon Bunshaft and Natalie de Blois of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM) in the International Style. Lever House, the Seagram Building, the former Union Carbide Building, and the Pepsi-Cola Building are part of a grouping of International Style structures developed on Park Avenue from 46th to 59th Street during the mid-20th century. Although the building was completed in 1952, the design largely incorporates ideas first proposed by Le Corbusier and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in the 1920s. The building was constructed by main contractor George A. Fuller Company, with Jaros, Baum & Bolles as mechanical engineers; Weiskopf & Pickworth as structural engineers; and Raymond Loewy Associates as interior designers. It was built and named for the Lever Brothers Company, a soap company that was an American subsidiary of Unilever. Lever House contains the equivalent of 24 stories, including 21 usable office stories and a triple-height mechanical space, and stands tall. Form Lever House's ground level is largely composed of an outdoor plaza, paved in light- and dark-colored terrazzo, with some indoor sections. A rectangular planted garden with a pool is at the center of the plaza. Lever House's plaza is legally a privately owned public space. To protect against