The New World Trade Center design has been chosen. In my opinion, the other contender was a far better plan which provided for some of the most unique architecture on the planet. The winning design is yet another giant corporate cock sticking out of the island of Manhattan.
The two plans:
Team Think (the good design)—almost womb-like in the way it suspended amazing shapes inside it’s light and airy structure: a totally unique approach, which included suspending the memorials 1,500 feet in the air.
Studio Daniel Libeskind (the winning design) —has some nice elements, including an enormous enclosed glass space and multi-story nature parks. Of course it features a giant spire reaching toward the heavens and a lot more office space. I like a lot of this design, but the attempts at symbolism are just too blatant. For example, the profile is supposed to resemble the statue of Liberty, and the building’s spire is to be 1,776 feet tall in order to correspond with the date of the Declaration of Independence.
5 responses so far ↓
1 tone // Feb 27, 2003 at 11:28 am
after checking out both slide shows, my initial reaction is that the first one is mainly a piece of sculpture, but that the second is more inviting, more organic, more reverential – more american than the first. The lattice sculpture idea seems like its trying to completely shake itself free of cultural identity – the cultural center is in suspension. Looking at the mock-ups, I think “who is going to hang out in this area of town? No like. Cultural center must be surrounded by culture.
it reminds me of the eiffel tower vs. notre dame. the eiffel tower will always just be an abstract viewing tower – all bones and no skin or organs or pleasant face. notre dame has life, has power, has a face.
i want to visit the site, hang out near it.
i just wish they didn’t pick the statue of liberty as a reflection point. a copy of a copy of a copy. but i wonder, what other cities have modern sky-scraper interpretations of some large traditional statue or symbol in the same city?
the first design says we want to include everyone here and we don’t want any trace of americanism. we want something that wouldn’t offend anyone. any culture can deal with this site because it doesn’t visually remind us of anything we can recognize. blank the message. put your own message here in the skeleton of what was the trade centers. Seems too easy, too timid, too intent on looking away from the pot of humanity surrounding it.
i don’t mind some americanism – it just has to good americanism. are the statue of liberty and 1776 the best choices? i’m not so sure about that, but i might prefer it to the sterility of the other choice.
2 scotty the body // Feb 27, 2003 at 12:03 pm
I’m not so sure I’m going to want to hang out in an enormous glass room located at the site of the most devestating (to date) act of terrorism in history. i think i’d get a little nervous. of course, i’d be nervous at 1500 feet too.
i think the winning design had excellent ground treatments, which I will concede are better than the THINK design. the stark, uninspiring buildings aren’t really anything special at all. just because one’s tall doesn’t make one great.
But the THINK design was something that is special—a truly worldless, inspiring spot, that paid tribute to the towers that once stood there. Supported within the ghost of the towers were cultural and educational facilities—destinations that bring people together which, I’m assuming, the architects hoped September 11th would utlimately do.
Both choices are remarkable, but one was truly unique.
Obviously the THINK design did not have the financial interest of the lease holer in mind, which is what ultimately made the choice, I’m sure.
3 nic // Feb 27, 2003 at 12:51 pm
My thought is that it is in New York, so who cares?
4 tone // Feb 27, 2003 at 2:58 pm
while i agree that all things considered, one design may have been picked because it offered some chance for commerce, that doesn’t mean the hollow rectangles are very inspiring. i think you can inspire togetherness by having it be a more inviting center of life. that’s why the ground treatment is so important. more utility, and hence a little commercialism, would by necessity make it more of a living appendage to the city. the think design looks like an enormous gravemarker suspending a carter center. the shapes and placements of the people pods also seem haphazard.
and the garden spire is pretty cool stuff.
5 scotty the body // Feb 28, 2003 at 1:52 pm
The garden spire is pretty damned cool, I’ll admit that.
But so are strangely-colored suspended people pods 800 feet in the air.
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