Let's take a closer look at the just-announced designs for Freedom's Friends at the World Trade Center Site, shall we. David Dunlap observes, "It may look like an instance of urban randomness." True, that—and yet, on first blush, we're quite taken with the group.
TOWER 2
Architect: Norman Foster
Design Concept: 78 stories (taller, in height, than the Empire State Building). Four diamonds on the roof slant to the memorial below. Probably architecurally superior to the Freedom Tower, begging the question of how Childs let it slip through.
In a Word: Bling!
TOWER 3
Architect: Richard Rogers
Design Concept: 71 stories. Beams form a trippy exposed framework. The longer we stare at it, the more we're drawn in. Oddly compelling.
In a Word: Skeletal!
TOWER 4
Architect: Fumihiko Maki
Design Concept: 61 stories that strike us as surprisingly bland despite its parallelogram-cum-trapezoid scheme. Writes Dunlap, "The upper part of the facade inclines toward the towers to the north and is meant as a unifying gesture." Um, okay.
In a Word: Blah!
· BREAKING: Freedom Tower's Friends Come Out to Play [Curbed]