Yet, even as newer, taller buildings have since risen around it; and as other central business districts like BGC boast of their own share of sleek skyscrapers that dot the skyline, the Rufino Pacific Tower remains an enduring symbol of progress and entrepreneurial spirit — a testament to what can be achieved when brilliant minds come together to bring forth a vision to life.
Manila to Makati
“The original Rufino building was an eight-story structure built in 1963,” recounts Carlos “Charlie” Rufino, president of sustainable real estate developer NEO and part of the original team that spearheaded the Rufino Pacific Tower. “The misconception is that the current tower is built on top of that first structure. It was actually built on the parking lot that was located behind it.”
Prior to this, the older generation of Rufinos — siblings Esther, Vicente, Ernesto and Rafael — were movie house owners and operators in downtown Manila, including the EVER Theater built in 1955 that carried their initials.
Their foray into the fledgling yet burgeoning Makati business district marked one of their first projects outside of the “Ever Loyal City” of Manila that was then the hub of trade, business and commerce. (Herrera Street, where the Rufino Pacific Tower partly stands, was renamed V.A. Rufino Street in 2002 in honor of Charlie’s father, lawyer Vicente A. Rufino)
Enter First Pacific
It was sometime in the 1990s that Charlie was invited to join First Pacific Co. Ltd., the Hong-Kong headquartered firm founded by Manuel V. Pangilinan and the Salim group. “We decided to put up our first project on Ayala Avenue and that was the time that we also decided that an office tower would be the thing that we would do,” says Rufino.
The idea of building on the old parking lot, Rufino says, was at his mother Remedios' insistence, as the 1963 building — designed by the firm of National Artist Juan Nakpil— had received many architectural awards. “Thus, we did not touch the concrete facade of the old structure although we did change some of the reflective glass to replace the old glass,” he says.
Take me higher
The vision to build what would be the tallest building in Metro Manila was, like the earlier decision of retaining the original Rufino building, based in part on family legacy. “Avenue Theater and Hotel in Avenida, Rizal, which my father and his siblings owned, was at that time the tallest building in the area,” says Rufino.
“This decade and on to the ‘90s, the Rufino Tower rises above them all, reaching new heights…” stated a press release announcing the project. “Avant-garde and innovative designs will be integrated to complete this tower…designed in such a way that is reflective of the busy, active and energetic business world.”
With Rufino as chair of project developer First Pacific Realty Partners Corp., the project team included Architect Lito Calayan who collaborated with Adrian Wilson International, a multidisciplinary engineering consulting firm; BF Corp. of Bayani Fernando which was tapped as contractor because they were already doing steel buildings; and a whole slew of professionals involved in project management, including a team from First Pacific that was assigned to the project out of Hong Kong and Australia.
Overcoming challenges
Constructing the Rufino Pacific Tower had its fair share of challenges, largely due to the construction method employed, Rufino recounts.
“As you know, it is a steel building and very tall—most other buildings were only about 20 floors and we were 40 floors,” he says. “So, when we were going at it very quickly, we also had to move materials and we had to use a big crane to lift the big steel columns up. That was also a learning curve for us.”
Standing strong
Described during its completion as “the building of the future built now,” the Rufino Pacific Tower, when finally inaugurated in 1993, “may have well cost a billion pesos” per a newspaper report, boasting of superior curtain wall technology among other state-of-the-art features.
“We used a very high-performance glass which was very good in minimizing the amount of heat gain coming into the building and because it was a light building and a steel building, we were able to make sure that it could withstand the forces of high winds and earthquakes,” shares Rufino.
The building, in fact, was designed to actually be very flexible, which helps in times when you have severe storms or earthquakes. Meanwhile, a two-and-a-half-foot sculpture by Ramon Orlina titled “The Legacy” adorns the lobby.
Early tenants apart from First Pacific, were Smart Communications which occupied multiple floors, the Embassy of France Trade Commission, Hewlett-Packard, and multinational advertising agency Lintas Manila, whose successor firm still holds office there. Multinational Investment Bancorporation would also eventually occupy the 41st floor, taking over from Metro Pacific Corp.
“We were very glad to be the pioneer of the tall building, " says Rufino. “It’s an imposing structure and having a very nice curtain wall glass made it very visible from all around the area.”
Features Reporter
