“Commissioned by the Hong Fok Investment Holding Company as an addition to an existing building, the thirty-story, four-hundred-thousand-square-foot International Building was Rudolph’s last effort in high-rise design. The tower sits on a small portion of the site, set back from the street, in one of the most congested urban areas of the city, surrounding buildings are twelve to fifteen stories high. Through the existing building one would access the five-story grand lobby and elevator core of the new office tower. As always, the building’s vertical structure is exposed at the base, lifting the body of the tower several stories off the ground. Executive offices on the outer edges of each floor form distinct volumes that cantilever far beyond the edge of the main structure, requiring diagonal bracing. These cantilevered volumes help break down the scale of the building and are perhaps its most distinctive formal elements. The project remained incomplete and in the design-development phase at the time of the architect’s death.”
De Alba, Roberto. Paul Rudolph: The Late Work. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2003. P. 146