Darren Bradley
Well-Known Member
This is one of my favorite buildings in NYC, although I'm betting most people would pass it by without a second glance. In fact, as I was shooting this, I got a lot of stares from curious passers-by, and some questions about why I was taking photos of this building.
Anyway, there are historical reasons why it's a very significant building (it was the very first glass curtain-wall bank building every designed... previously, they'd always tried to look like stone temples or fortresses. But the chairman of the board of the bank who commissioned this wanted to convey a sense of openness and transparency. So he asked for an all-glass building lit like a jewel, where the floors appear to float inside without any support. The result was this revolutionary design, which was copied by banks and other office buildings around the world for decades to come. Now, we've gone back to stucco and plaster versions of the old fortress-like buildings, it would seem... This bank was closed and turned into a clothing store a couple of years ago.
Notwithstanding the historical reasons, I just think it looks cool!
By the way, this was designed by the same architect (Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill) who also designed the tall high rise that was photo #1 in my other series on New York. You can probably see a resemblance. That taller building was the very first glass high-rise building in the world, and was built three years before the bank in this photo.
Anyway, there are historical reasons why it's a very significant building (it was the very first glass curtain-wall bank building every designed... previously, they'd always tried to look like stone temples or fortresses. But the chairman of the board of the bank who commissioned this wanted to convey a sense of openness and transparency. So he asked for an all-glass building lit like a jewel, where the floors appear to float inside without any support. The result was this revolutionary design, which was copied by banks and other office buildings around the world for decades to come. Now, we've gone back to stucco and plaster versions of the old fortress-like buildings, it would seem... This bank was closed and turned into a clothing store a couple of years ago.
Notwithstanding the historical reasons, I just think it looks cool!
By the way, this was designed by the same architect (Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill) who also designed the tall high rise that was photo #1 in my other series on New York. You can probably see a resemblance. That taller building was the very first glass high-rise building in the world, and was built three years before the bank in this photo.
