NEW YORK CITY-L&L Holding Co., the master leaseholder of 425 Park Ave. in the Plaza District, is asking the world’s best and brightest architects to bring their ‘A’ game to the property. The company has invited 11 top architectural firms to participate in a design competition to create a new skyscraper on the site, replacing the current 559,763-square-foot tower spanning 55^th and 56^th Streets.

David Levinson, chairman and CEO of L&L Holding, describes the opportunity as an “once-in-a-lifetime” moment. “It’s not often that you get a vacant building on Park Avenue and it’s the first time that’s happened in 50 years,” he tells GlobeSt.com. “It’s a very important moment and we want to create the finest building we possibly can and we are going out to what we believe are some of the brightest, creative architectural minds out there who work with us and collaborate with us in creating this very important iconic structure.”

The impetus behind the competition, Levinson says, is based around the existing structure’s age. “The building is going to be 65 years old, and that is a very old building,” he notes. Last year, TIAA-CREF purchased a 100% fee interest in the land and improvements for $315.9 million, and at the same time, L&L received the rights to control the improvements until the expiration of the master lease in 2090, SEC filings show.