Title: Lower Manhattan 1972
Subtitle: April 5, 1972
Text: The bold scale of the skyscrapers designed in the 1960s and their effect on the architectural character of downtown is dramatized in this photograph which shows the district essentially sliced into two parts--old and new-- around Liberty Street. A series of monumental modern towers--the World Trade Center, 1 Liberty Plaza, 140 Broadway, and 1 Chase Manhattan Plaza--are sheer slabs of steel and glass rising sixty or more stories in open plazas that carve a wide path through the heart of the historic core.
In stark contrast, the buildings of the first half of the century seem like ornate miniatures. Densely clustered, often several on a narrow block, they averaged twenty to forty stories, although several slender Art Deco spires climbed to sixty or more. All were clad in masonry--stone, brick, or terra cotta, the materials of the era -- giving the phrase "the canyons of Wall Street" a reality.
 |
|
 |
 |