November 9, 2004
Freedom Tower Architect Sued For Taking Design
A former Yale architecture student is suing architect David Childs and architecture firm Skidmore, Owings, & Merrill, claiming they stole his design and used it for Freedom Tower at the WTC site. Thomas Shine and his lawyer say that in 1999, Shine's design for "Olympic Tower" was evaluated in Yale class by Childs who said of the twisted tower and exterior grid, "It is a very beautiful shape. You took the skin and developed it around the form - great." Naturally, Childs hasn't been available for comment. Gothamist thinks Daniel Libeskind is laughing somewhere. Childs is the master architect of Freedom Tower, ever since developer Larry Silverstein appointed him in charge of the building and taking that power from WTC site master planner Libeskind. Gothamist think the current design sucks, so it might present a curious dilemma for Childs: Either deny he took ideas from Shine (ideas are derivative!) and stand behind Freedom Tower, which is most likely, or claim that the acid reflux made him delirious and caused him to crib Shine's design and create this mess.
LMDC's site on the Freedom Tower design. Gothamist on the fighting between Childs and Libeskind and the building's aspirations to be the tallest.
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That's right, the design sucks. It looks like deformed ice cubes from deformed ice cube trays.
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Too Funny! So much for an original Design!!
If it's true (Would not surprise me in the Least) David Childs should be run out of town...
Oh, this is TOO rich! Sometimes I have to wonder how Larry Silverstein was able to sign the lease for the towers in the first place. You usually don't find money-grubbers with the IQ of a handball.
Who of us would be surprised if in six months the LDMC just said, "forget it" and wiped the slate clean?
PS: Jen, "the design sucks"? Please elaborate...
Surveys have found that most New Yorkers just want the new towers to simply look like the old ones. It would actually help with the psychological aspect of going on with our lives if the skyline returned to its old look.
those surveys are hogwash, james. new yorkers are not that anti-progressive. there's nothing psychologically helpful about trying to relive the past by building a monument to it so you can pretend nothing ever happened. if you STILL haven't 'gotten on with your life' because the skyline doesn't look the same, then perhaps you should look beyond the skyline for psychological help.
At least he could have cribbed a better design.
hijiki, It's safe to say that I've gotten on with my life, *BUT* I'd rather the old skyline was put back too.
This has nothing to do with Nostalgia or sentimentality, but my personal aesthetic. Call me a Square, but I want a Skyline with Right Angles in it, not something from Star Trek.
Hijiki obviously has heart.
Every single time I see a photograph or a film of pre-2001 New York, I see the twin towers and I have to be constantly reminded: "this was shot before 9/11, before thousands of people died."
There is nothing wrong with regaining a sense of normalcy. Face it--the old towers were an integral part of the NYC skyline, along the lines of the Chrysler and Empire State buildings.
Imagine if the Eiffel Tower in Paris was destroyed, and they rebuilt it with a "Freedom Tower"-esque building. Their skyline wouldn't quite have the same soul.
Gothamist, I am surprised you didn't note that this is not unlike an episode of Law and Order: CI, involving a polygamous archtiect, a stalker-like architecture student, and murder outside Grad Central.
Gothamist, I am surprised you didn't note that this is not unlike an episode of Law and Order: CI, involving a polygamous archtiect, a stalker-like architecture student, and murder outside Grand Central. But no Vincent D'Onfrio.
Gothamist, I am surprised you didn't note that this is not unlike an episode of Law and Order: CI, involving a polygamous architect, a stalker-like architecture student, and murder outside Grand Central. But no Vincent D'Onfrio.
those towers were designed in a different era. it would be unamerican to not look forward and build something that reflects who we are now. today. everyone's so scared of the new... just like they were when the wtc towers were originally built. if you were around then, you would have complained that it wasn't the same skyline and that they dwarfed the other skyscrapers (as many did).
i doubt paris would ever rebuild the eiffel tower if it were destroyed just because anything new would look 'different'. if that was their mentality, it wouldn't have been built in the first place.
i'm not saying the childs building is particularly inspired, but at least it's honest about where we are in history. copying the past is truly soulless.
#1, the WTC was a icon of power, the 110 floors,to me
and 10000's of people around the world, to make a new name,
"Freedom Tower" and to make it 40 floors less, shows the world,
that we fear, this does not make things better,
in time, NY will get it, but as of now, "the fear little tower"
will..allways be "a tower of fear" until they put the WTC back the way it was,
with the same name, things don't get better. REBUILD THE TWINS!!!!!the same but better