Trump:The design for the Freedom Tower is an egghead design, designed by an egghead, which has no practical application and which, frankly, didn't look very good.
I've gotten great reviews on my buildings. I'm somebody who believes strongly in great architecture and this [the Freedom Tower] was a design that is just not a good design.
Libeskind (representative): I suppose Trump wants to add an extra floor to make room for his name. That's probably not the kind of iconic symbol anyone had in mind for this site.
That's it! This is the last straw!!! Trump will be unveiling HIS scheme for the WTC today at a highly publicized press conference. Why aren't you guys up in arms about this? I don't care if you agree with Libeskind/Child's design or not... I don't care if you think Trump's "design" is the right thing to do, it is not the point. This is a highly publicized power grab and we aren't the ones doing the grabbing.
We must fight Trump and his effort with everything we have. Make no mistake about it, this is a full on attack on us and our profession -- we have been diminished to out of touch "eggheads".
We cannot let Trump undermine architects and our very existince in the building process. We cannot let his charicature of architects stand and settle into the hearts and minds of Americans. You think we are out of the loop and unimportant to society now??? Just wait.
This is a powergrab, taking away what little control we have over the built environment, and putting it into the hands of businessmen and developers. This is not only about the WTC, this will have far reaching reprecussions.
MAKE SOME NOISE!!!! GET THE WORD OUT TO OUR FELLOW ARCHITECTS AND STUDENTS!!! WE MUST STAND UP FOR LIBESKIND AND ARCHITECTS!!! WHAT THE HELL ARE WE WAITING FOR???
hey, he's underminig daniel "most of my clients are dead people" liebskin, it's not that big of a deal...
man, architects make mistakes ALL the time, some (most) architects are actually shit, even the superstars.
dvelopers rule the construction world, THEY ALWAYS HAVE AND THEY ALWAYS WILL, stop believing that there was some kind of mythological past when corbusier would just get copious ammounts of money for no specified reason.
maybe its time we start chilling, and start listening to the developers instead of anatgonising them, so we can collaborate with them and produce better buildings than the ones which are being designed by quantity surveyors, because the developers can't be fucked to deal with a bunch of idiots talking about death, memory and constellations, when all they are doing is design an office block.
and finally, since when are lay people not entitled to have their own opinion on Architecture? you're designing FOR them, for fuck's sake...
ah, sorry, it's end of year and i'm not sleeping too much.
Am I missing something? When have architects ever been anything but complicit with the interests and desires of big money and power? If the creative ambitions of this profession have fallen out of favor with the ruling Alpha-culture (that it typically upholds), it's not because we've lost the power of our voice, it's because the people in charge have lost interest in what we have to say (and a quick look around at the American built environment tells me that they haven't had much interest in that voice for some time now).
I think the reality of the profession is much more dire than your impassioned plea suggests. In this country architects are little more than window-dressers and decorators for the elite, who couldn't care less about the psuedo-political and vaguely informed social agendas of people who spend most of their time coveting over-priced eye-glasses and new software to dream up ever-less relevant graphic hallucinations.
Of course there are exceptions...but would anyone really expect these particular circumstances to be any different? If anything, architecture materializes the dominant ideology of the day, and from that perspective- I'd say we're right on track!
what? a developer wanting to copy a pre-existing design for a new project? i'm taken aback!
i'm with you erich, though as qualudes says, i think things are already worse off than you're worrying about.
also, as for trump's opinion - he may be ignorant of meaningful architectural design, but he's by no means a lay person. he's the most self-centered, washed out, undeservedly arrogant, pathetic, flop of a human being on the planet at this moment. i couldn't care less what his opinion is on anything, unless it's how to take a bunch of money you inherit and lose it through being a poor businessman. however, the fact that his opinion on this issue is receiving ANY attention is just disgusting.
personally i think they should build the foster design, danny...getting the commision was simply style over substance, and his presentaion skills..."i remember when i came to this country...blah blah blah, (que the tears)...my building will rise 1776 ft in the air" ...obviosly liebskinds relative iexperience let him get steamrolled by childs (who made a mediocre design even worse)...i think in the long run the new freedom tower if had been built would have done more harm to architects then scraping it now.
I wish the city would just assume control of the site and put a minimal park there. It wouldn't require a massive chunk of insurance settlement money to construct and it would leave a void where people could just hang out, rather than having to produce, consume or represent anything. Why are we always trying to fill things up with more crap...
The Donald was on the King last night on Crap News Network. I happened to catch it. Great guy that Donald. He mentioned how he went to his wife's country for 15 minutes, said hi to his in-laws and left. He said Melania will be a wonderful mom...he made it clear that he'll be doing his thing and not see the kids much, but she'll be a great mom. Hopefully these two will divorce before they have kids.
But here is the WTC bit:
ING: Now, speaking of real estate, I come to New York and there's a major squabble, and you're in the middle taking on Pataki and everybody else. You want to rebuild the Trade Center like the Trade Center only a little bigger?
D. TRUMP: I'm not really taking on Pataki. He's a friend of mine. In fact, he was on last week's episode of "The Apprentice." So, I mean, he's a friend of mine. He's a good guy and he's a good governor. But I disagree with what he's doing on the World Trade Center. I think the World Trade Center should be rebuilt as the World Trade Center, only stronger and one story taller. I hate what they're doing with the World Trade Center site.
KING: Because?
D. TRUMP: It is designed by an egg-head architect, a guy who really -- give me a break. The buildings are terrible. It's not really a building as such. It is 60 stories of building and 40 stories of frame.
They're having a hard time structurally even holding up the frame. You know, the top of that building, they say it is 1,776 ft., which is a nice number because of what it represents, but it is not really a building, per se.
It's just ridiculous. It is just the frame at the top of a building. It doesn't look good. Then the buildings surrounding it are all different angles, they're all conflicting angles and the architecture is terrible.
What I would like to see -- you know the way I look at it? If they build that, the terrorists win. If they build a World Trade Center but stronger and one story taller -- now then you have a problem. Because whether it's Freedom Tower or the World Trade Center, a lot of people say that it's going to be very tough to rent anything in that building.
KING: Might be.
D. TRUMP: I wish Larry Silverstein a lot of luck. It is easy for me to say: Build a World Trade Center. But the fact is a lot of people are saying it's going to be very, very tough. Larry just built a building right next to the site on one of the other buildings that came down. So far there's no tenants.
KING: Why do you say, then, build a big one?
D. TRUMP: Well, it doesn't have to be me that owns it.
(LAUGHTER)
(CROSSTALK)
KING: Didn't they want to do it as a memorial as much as a commercial enterprise?
D. TRUMP: I would say this: You either build the World Trade Center as it was, you do it bigger, better, stronger, more beautiful; or you build a great park, memorial park. I don't think you should build what they call Freedom Tower. Give me a break.
KING: So either one or the other?
D. TRUMP: I think one or the other. You have to really look at the market, though. I think it will be very, very hard to rent that building.
KING: We'll be right back with more from Donald Trump. And his wife is coming soon. Don't go away.
ericharch... about Libeskind and standing up for him... When Nina and Daniel pranced into New York, she bragged that they took on the mayor of Berlin and persisted with the Jewish museum until it got built, despite tremendous political pressure against it. They thought NY would be the same. The funniest part about all this is that the Donald can't even figure out that Libeskind had very little to do with the current design. Well...formerly current. He already was deposed long ago. Oddly enough, there is a twin tower design out there by Foster. You know what... I'm glad Donald Trump is tossing himself into this. You can't script this stuff. You can't write a weirder story. He's even onto something true when he proposes the option of making the site into a great park. that's it. no more, no less.
I completely agree with Javier's fascination with the Donald's role in this. He's only one or two degrees away from "less is more" or promoting "affect" as a post-critical position..."if we light it up with a sustained and all-encompassing blue glow, they will come..."
oh yeah.. this is really good. The Gutter has some funny trash on Libeskind today. Looks like Danny has got himself some sort of Per Corell on his ass now.
has an item by a friend of mine. Unfortunately she has the news all wrong. The Sac Tower was not likened to the freedom tower. The likeness was with one of the other site towers proposed. Take a look
I would be more upset about this if I thought that the Freedom Tower was Daniel's design, but I do not. It's David Child's design and I believe he is crap, and I actually believe that Trump has a point, and I think that Childs sold out to developers years ago and has been designing crap ever since.
This is not to say that I think Trump has any right to come out with his own Freedom Tower design and completely bypass the entire community vetting process that the WTC site design went through with the competition, but let's be honest here......
....did Child's tower go through any community vetting process? If it did I missed it.
I don't think either of their towers should be built, I think there should be another competition for that building entirely. But I don't have a problem with Trump, he's been OK with me ever since he came out and said that Bush was an idiot for starting war in Iraq and that he would have fired him. I would love to see Bush on the Apprentice. He would have been kicked off weeks ago.
trump's explanation of his views is pretty entertaining. very lucidly and eloquently argued. "It is designed by an egg-head architect, a guy who really -- give me a break. The buildings are terrible. It's not really a building as such. It is 60 stories of building and 40 stories of frame." stutter stutter, duh, i really hadn't thought that i'd have to back up my loudmouthed, uninformed claims...
the only piece of reasonable info there is the last line, which also explains why the building design is much more reasonable and realistic as a buiding than "trump's" idea. as trump himself says (and is the only thing he's correct about), it's going to be a very difficult sell to fill out those upper stories, whatever the design.
though i certainly have my reservations about libeskind's design, especially the childs-ized version, the current design at least provides a solution that allows for a monumental and proud scale, while not just creating a ton of 'wasted' space. 40 stories of (relatively) non-profitable, public memorial space at the top of a building in one of the most expensive areas of the world is actually a very appropriate and even beautiful concept. it's the one piece of this whole catastrophe that says "maybe we aren't as materialistic and greedy as the world thinks we are". it's the one concept that actually "beats" the terrorists instead of reinforcing their ideologies and beliefs.
that said, i think that a simple park would demonstrate or realizes that concept at least as well. realistically though, i just don't see that happening in the sea of gross selfish greed that is this project.
See, het, that 40 stories at the top of the tower? I have a problem with it.....somebody (I don't know who, i'm sorry) once said that "it looked like a skeleton, and the last thing that Lower Manhattan needs is a skeleton built on that site". I kind of have to agree with this.
i've never seen the skeleton reference in the design myself. i've looked for it, but i just don't see it. but if it is there, i'd like it. it IS a site for skeletons, and we shouldn't forget that. and even before 9/11, i would have argued that a skeleton was exactly what downtown manhattan needs. in that case, to represent both those trampled by international corporate greed, of which lower manhattan is a nexus for, and to represent the empty shells of humanity that control that financial nexus.
pretty extreme there i know.. sorry. :)
Again, I am not upset about the design. I could truly care less. I am upset about what it means for architects. I am upset about what it means for our profession -- our jobs. I don't care about it in any philisophical or political way. Nor do I care about Libeskind or his design in any personal way.
I know developers rule the building world, but this is one of the few high profile **ARCHITECTURAL** projects left in this country. Probably the only one that everyone in this country is familiar with. To see the architect -- no matter who he may be -- tossed off as an out of touch egghead and then undermined by Trump, a self-centered, publicity hungry developer... well, I think it is a big deal. It affects all of us. It could affect our ability to get jobs and commissions for interesting projects. For me, this is about the reputation of architects and nothing else.
I am aware that many architects, for better or worse, have back ourselves into a corner where our primary service is "design". Design IS the last straw, and that is being undermined and taken away from us too. But ok, we'll let them have that too. Hell, what do I care, I'm going into real estate anyway :)
I can see tomorrow's NY Post story already:
Libeskind, YOU'RE FIRED!
Love to hear the passionate support for the architects and the profession, the ericharch is right on !!!
The thing is that architects are not the developers in this case, so we (they) just have to provide the best service for our(their) clients, the daniel design was probably the best service he could provide at that time, the trump is just in for publicity, i insist that there are only 2 viable possibilities:
one - letting the darth provide the design services,
two - form the Archinecters Design Group, and let us present our passionate design services, hell we'll do it better !!!
even more amazing.. that the general public would side with developers against architects, thinking that we're out of touch.. well, let me think, who's more out of touch? the architects who is (under)paid to represent and serve not only the client, but the public - or the developer who doesn't give a shite about anyone or anything but THEIR money?
So, let me see if i have this right. First we have a situation as old as the profession itself...developer vs public art, artist vs cheapskate, etc...and the world wonders whey aren't playing nice over the most lucrative piece of land and architecture this nation has seen in over 100 years??? Anyone who thought that all the characters would play nicely is out of touch...and maybe thats what the final lesson of this project will be....to education the average person what a struggle it is to get a worthwhile building of magnitude constructed.
as for Trump...who the f^@* cares what this asshat has to say, anyway? it sounds to me like the group who has wanted a rebuilt-as-is-WTC-middle-finger-to-the-terrorists has finally found a proponent with a voice obnoxious enough to make their plight public. he may agree with the notion but probably just because its cheaper (read economical in trump-speak) to build. ONE STORY TALLER??? if this is a middle finger its a piddly one...oooohhhh so intimidating...another 12 feet taller....
i think the most important part of the post article hasn't been touched on...that being the rumor that the state could take over the site by emminent domain if Silverstein doesn't get his act together....if that could even happen, i'd love to see it. then i'm assuming some type of public forum could actually be used to discuss the issues at hand rather than have one man hold the purse strings...of course the downside to this is that everyone would balk at the cost and we'd get a watered down VE WTC anyway...so its a lose-lose... maybe the best thing is 'no building' and just the memorial. all this tarnished bickering isn't doing much for 'rememberance' or monumentality is it?
plus, wouldn't it be nice if the state did take control that they need someone who knows NYC real estate to guide the process...hmm...who's such a self-proclaimed good friend of Pataki??? lets look at Trump's real reasons for opening his mouth here, let alone for spending the money to commission a design and model.
Exactly Heterarchy... he will try to sell it to the public and steal the project by appealing to peoples raw emotions and sense of nostalgia for the towers. He is a great saleman.
It's pretty upsetting that a bunch of powergrabbing is going on at the site of the world's most visible graveyard.
Didn't we all just want to see something phenomenal there.....doesn't it deserve that? Something absolutely mind-boggling.....forward-thinking.....something that says, "yeah, 21st century, Ok, we're here now".
I wish they would kick them all off and start over.
the real problem with this entire fiasco has been that every single player has made it into a personal crusade- what major player can we point who hasn't thought that this is the chance to shape their legacy? giuliani, pataki, bloomberg, libeskind, childs, doctoroff, silverstein and so on. trump's idea won't get built, we all know that, but at least maybe it will shake things up and make the public realize how completely backwards this has all become. it is extremely shameful how off target the whole process is. i see it as no threat to architects - some architect will be involved in this in the end since it is so visible. it IS a threat to libeskind and childs, but i see that as a blessing. at this point, i would be happier if brad cloepfil clad the former building design in terra cotta and glass than if the freedom tower were built.
oi. i've been trying to reserve some respect for libeskind all this time, if nothing else because there's just NO one else in the process that i don't want to personally beat senseless. but that letter is a spineless cowardly piece of crap. it should have read something like, "go run some other project in to debt and ruin (as is your m.o.). if you'd like to register a complaint, here are two tickets to the gun show.. do you feel lucky, punk? do ya?"
actually, i think Daniel had a pretty good zing in there about "the shape of one's head or its decorative accessory"...nice. this is petty, sure but you have to give the guy at least one 'atta-boy' for that line.
i'll give him the atta boy for that line. i just wish he had stood up for himself and his part of the project - or more importantly for the profession of architecture, as opposed to focusing on shifting blame. from a professional standpoint, he only shifted the blame to another 'egg headed' architect. and along the lines of the original theme of this thread, the issue here is bigger than the individual architects. trump insulted the profession of architecture, and libeskind only reinforced the criticism. that's the part that i call spineless.
but yeah, that is a pretty clever line. :)
I don't see this as an attack on the proffesion, it is, if anything an attack on this whole debacle, remember trump only spoke up after the fact that pataki said they were reconsidering due to consultaion of the police...? whatever that means....i think it means they thought the design sucked...they are politicians so they can't say that... so they get trump to pipe up...trump being the publicity whore agrees...win win for all but danny and childs.....so what? a "starchitect" gets taken down a notch, his ego is big enough...he'll build somewhere else...some museum or something deserving of such sublime meaning......i think they should just make a park and min. memorial
"The Libeskind site plan (The New York Times) - a plan without meaning. The four new super skyscrapers are dark blue. With this plan, the terrorists win. "
this quote was on the site...this is taking it too far.....the terrorists wanted us to make "weird" architecture....so out of contexts...that pisses me off!
no matter what gets done on the site, it will be done in good faith - according to the best hopes of whoever comes out on top. trump making derogatory comments about a scheme, ugly or not, by saying 'the terrorists win' is just tacky and inappropriate.
trump...'tacky and inappropriate'...NO...say it isn't so...
i think the same could be said of pretty much every gold-lettered
self-named tower trump's put up in manhattan over the past
thirty or so years.
and steven i'd love to believe that this will get done in good faith
according to the best hopes of whomever..but this project has so
many hands in it, has so much politics wrapped around it and is
so overburdened by so many opinions (as well as the actual owner
of the site wanting to make some money at some point)..that i
can't see this project turning out as anything other than a muddled
mess of the initial vision that libeskind had...at best.
but maybe i'm jaded...i mean how does the nypd step in after
three years and send everyone back to the drawing board?
Yup, but it's a simple and effective strategy. The US has proven that anyone with power that says 'you are against ....blah blah blah .... terrorists win....blah blah balh" is believed.
Sad. I say fire them all! Make a pretty park that everyone will love, then have another competition open to everyone.
I find it ironically amusing that the buildings won't even rent. hasn't lower manhattan been something like 70% vacant for at least a decade?
he's right - the freedom tower doesn't "look very good." It just doesn't.
And everybody out there who want ground zero to be a park - what a stunning lack of creativity you all have. Have you been there? - have you seen how big the hole is and how little urbanity exists around it? It would just be a dumb hole in the middle of downtown. The whole river's edge is already a park. NYC doesn't need more parks. Let's have a memorial in the old wtc footprints and then turn over the rest of the site to our real current needs. downtown needs energy, downtown needs commerce, downtown needs heterogeneity, downtown needs excitement. Lay down a grid manhattan style and let the speculation begin.
j-turn: i agree with you for the most part but a lot of voices are saying the rental demand is just not there, while dan doctoroff says silverstein is just charging too much for rent. i think that what a lot of people mean is not a big empty park but a park with the museum and performance hall.
ericharch- this stuff happens all the time in arch. now because danny boy does'nt have much sack and is getting rolled over from every angle is the reason this looks so bad....sick'em nina
park with the museum and performance hall ... how PC: yawn!
It's new york ... we, er they, have the met, moma, guggi, whitney, lincoln center. .. etc. the city's not culturally deprived. but downtown is seriously lacking in some real new york city urbanity. all they have is wall st on one side - pure commercial/ office and battery park on the other side - pure residential. it would be interesting to use the wtc site to get some mixing going. stir the pot - create fabric, community - ahhh now i'm sounding all PC!
all this to say - well, i think trump is probably going the wrong way, but its all hella entertaining. Also very sad - especially when one takes a moment to remember the tragedy that motivated all of this sick vanity.
Am I the only one that has some seriously complicated emotions around the whole ground zero question?
Yes CalebRichers, this stuff does happen all the time in architecture. But when it does, it usually isn't written up on CNN and the NYT. And it usually doesn't involve a celebrity calling the architect an "egghead" with a bad design in the national media! Most importantly, it doesn't involve turning the nation against architects.
This is much bigger and much more important than the everyday occurances of architects getting screwed.
Moment of Truth for Architects
FROM ARCHINECT NEWS:
Trump:The design for the Freedom Tower is an egghead design, designed by an egghead, which has no practical application and which, frankly, didn't look very good.
I've gotten great reviews on my buildings. I'm somebody who believes strongly in great architecture and this [the Freedom Tower] was a design that is just not a good design.
Libeskind (representative): I suppose Trump wants to add an extra floor to make room for his name. That's probably not the kind of iconic symbol anyone had in mind for this site.
http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/43569.htm
That's it! This is the last straw!!! Trump will be unveiling HIS scheme for the WTC today at a highly publicized press conference. Why aren't you guys up in arms about this? I don't care if you agree with Libeskind/Child's design or not... I don't care if you think Trump's "design" is the right thing to do, it is not the point. This is a highly publicized power grab and we aren't the ones doing the grabbing.
We must fight Trump and his effort with everything we have. Make no mistake about it, this is a full on attack on us and our profession -- we have been diminished to out of touch "eggheads".
We cannot let Trump undermine architects and our very existince in the building process. We cannot let his charicature of architects stand and settle into the hearts and minds of Americans. You think we are out of the loop and unimportant to society now??? Just wait.
This is a powergrab, taking away what little control we have over the built environment, and putting it into the hands of businessmen and developers. This is not only about the WTC, this will have far reaching reprecussions.
MAKE SOME NOISE!!!! GET THE WORD OUT TO OUR FELLOW ARCHITECTS AND STUDENTS!!! WE MUST STAND UP FOR LIBESKIND AND ARCHITECTS!!! WHAT THE HELL ARE WE WAITING FOR???
hey, he's underminig daniel "most of my clients are dead people" liebskin, it's not that big of a deal...
man, architects make mistakes ALL the time, some (most) architects are actually shit, even the superstars.
dvelopers rule the construction world, THEY ALWAYS HAVE AND THEY ALWAYS WILL, stop believing that there was some kind of mythological past when corbusier would just get copious ammounts of money for no specified reason.
maybe its time we start chilling, and start listening to the developers instead of anatgonising them, so we can collaborate with them and produce better buildings than the ones which are being designed by quantity surveyors, because the developers can't be fucked to deal with a bunch of idiots talking about death, memory and constellations, when all they are doing is design an office block.
and finally, since when are lay people not entitled to have their own opinion on Architecture? you're designing FOR them, for fuck's sake...
ah, sorry, it's end of year and i'm not sleeping too much.
and do what? lets have a sit in like its the 60's or something...u can be the "rosa parks" of architects...i'm apathetic to the wtc and danny
Am I missing something? When have architects ever been anything but complicit with the interests and desires of big money and power? If the creative ambitions of this profession have fallen out of favor with the ruling Alpha-culture (that it typically upholds), it's not because we've lost the power of our voice, it's because the people in charge have lost interest in what we have to say (and a quick look around at the American built environment tells me that they haven't had much interest in that voice for some time now).
I think the reality of the profession is much more dire than your impassioned plea suggests. In this country architects are little more than window-dressers and decorators for the elite, who couldn't care less about the psuedo-political and vaguely informed social agendas of people who spend most of their time coveting over-priced eye-glasses and new software to dream up ever-less relevant graphic hallucinations.
Of course there are exceptions...but would anyone really expect these particular circumstances to be any different? If anything, architecture materializes the dominant ideology of the day, and from that perspective- I'd say we're right on track!
what? a developer wanting to copy a pre-existing design for a new project? i'm taken aback!
i'm with you erich, though as qualudes says, i think things are already worse off than you're worrying about.
also, as for trump's opinion - he may be ignorant of meaningful architectural design, but he's by no means a lay person. he's the most self-centered, washed out, undeservedly arrogant, pathetic, flop of a human being on the planet at this moment. i couldn't care less what his opinion is on anything, unless it's how to take a bunch of money you inherit and lose it through being a poor businessman. however, the fact that his opinion on this issue is receiving ANY attention is just disgusting.
hey donald, you're fired! horrible jasckass.
personally i think they should build the foster design, danny...getting the commision was simply style over substance, and his presentaion skills..."i remember when i came to this country...blah blah blah, (que the tears)...my building will rise 1776 ft in the air" ...obviosly liebskinds relative iexperience let him get steamrolled by childs (who made a mediocre design even worse)...i think in the long run the new freedom tower if had been built would have done more harm to architects then scraping it now.
I wish the city would just assume control of the site and put a minimal park there. It wouldn't require a massive chunk of insurance settlement money to construct and it would leave a void where people could just hang out, rather than having to produce, consume or represent anything. Why are we always trying to fill things up with more crap...
Who is the equivalent to Trump in the architecture profession?
The Donald was on the King last night on Crap News Network. I happened to catch it. Great guy that Donald. He mentioned how he went to his wife's country for 15 minutes, said hi to his in-laws and left. He said Melania will be a wonderful mom...he made it clear that he'll be doing his thing and not see the kids much, but she'll be a great mom. Hopefully these two will divorce before they have kids.
But here is the WTC bit:
ING: Now, speaking of real estate, I come to New York and there's a major squabble, and you're in the middle taking on Pataki and everybody else. You want to rebuild the Trade Center like the Trade Center only a little bigger?
D. TRUMP: I'm not really taking on Pataki. He's a friend of mine. In fact, he was on last week's episode of "The Apprentice." So, I mean, he's a friend of mine. He's a good guy and he's a good governor. But I disagree with what he's doing on the World Trade Center. I think the World Trade Center should be rebuilt as the World Trade Center, only stronger and one story taller. I hate what they're doing with the World Trade Center site.
KING: Because?
D. TRUMP: It is designed by an egg-head architect, a guy who really -- give me a break. The buildings are terrible. It's not really a building as such. It is 60 stories of building and 40 stories of frame.
They're having a hard time structurally even holding up the frame. You know, the top of that building, they say it is 1,776 ft., which is a nice number because of what it represents, but it is not really a building, per se.
It's just ridiculous. It is just the frame at the top of a building. It doesn't look good. Then the buildings surrounding it are all different angles, they're all conflicting angles and the architecture is terrible.
What I would like to see -- you know the way I look at it? If they build that, the terrorists win. If they build a World Trade Center but stronger and one story taller -- now then you have a problem. Because whether it's Freedom Tower or the World Trade Center, a lot of people say that it's going to be very tough to rent anything in that building.
KING: Might be.
D. TRUMP: I wish Larry Silverstein a lot of luck. It is easy for me to say: Build a World Trade Center. But the fact is a lot of people are saying it's going to be very, very tough. Larry just built a building right next to the site on one of the other buildings that came down. So far there's no tenants.
KING: Why do you say, then, build a big one?
D. TRUMP: Well, it doesn't have to be me that owns it.
(LAUGHTER)
(CROSSTALK)
KING: Didn't they want to do it as a memorial as much as a commercial enterprise?
D. TRUMP: I would say this: You either build the World Trade Center as it was, you do it bigger, better, stronger, more beautiful; or you build a great park, memorial park. I don't think you should build what they call Freedom Tower. Give me a break.
KING: So either one or the other?
D. TRUMP: I think one or the other. You have to really look at the market, though. I think it will be very, very hard to rent that building.
KING: We'll be right back with more from Donald Trump. And his wife is coming soon. Don't go away.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0505/17/lkl.01.html
ericharch... about Libeskind and standing up for him... When Nina and Daniel pranced into New York, she bragged that they took on the mayor of Berlin and persisted with the Jewish museum until it got built, despite tremendous political pressure against it. They thought NY would be the same. The funniest part about all this is that the Donald can't even figure out that Libeskind had very little to do with the current design. Well...formerly current. He already was deposed long ago. Oddly enough, there is a twin tower design out there by Foster. You know what... I'm glad Donald Trump is tossing himself into this. You can't script this stuff. You can't write a weirder story. He's even onto something true when he proposes the option of making the site into a great park. that's it. no more, no less.
I completely agree with Javier's fascination with the Donald's role in this. He's only one or two degrees away from "less is more" or promoting "affect" as a post-critical position..."if we light it up with a sustained and all-encompassing blue glow, they will come..."
oh yeah.. this is really good. The Gutter has some funny trash on Libeskind today. Looks like Danny has got himself some sort of Per Corell on his ass now.
has an item by a friend of mine. Unfortunately she has the news all wrong. The Sac Tower was not likened to the freedom tower. The likeness was with one of the other site towers proposed. Take a look
Wow, you're really upset about this.
I would be more upset about this if I thought that the Freedom Tower was Daniel's design, but I do not. It's David Child's design and I believe he is crap, and I actually believe that Trump has a point, and I think that Childs sold out to developers years ago and has been designing crap ever since.
This is not to say that I think Trump has any right to come out with his own Freedom Tower design and completely bypass the entire community vetting process that the WTC site design went through with the competition, but let's be honest here......
....did Child's tower go through any community vetting process? If it did I missed it.
I don't think either of their towers should be built, I think there should be another competition for that building entirely. But I don't have a problem with Trump, he's been OK with me ever since he came out and said that Bush was an idiot for starting war in Iraq and that he would have fired him. I would love to see Bush on the Apprentice. He would have been kicked off weeks ago.
Anyway.
tectonic: accodring to trump, only trump is.
trump's explanation of his views is pretty entertaining. very lucidly and eloquently argued. "It is designed by an egg-head architect, a guy who really -- give me a break. The buildings are terrible. It's not really a building as such. It is 60 stories of building and 40 stories of frame." stutter stutter, duh, i really hadn't thought that i'd have to back up my loudmouthed, uninformed claims...
the only piece of reasonable info there is the last line, which also explains why the building design is much more reasonable and realistic as a buiding than "trump's" idea. as trump himself says (and is the only thing he's correct about), it's going to be a very difficult sell to fill out those upper stories, whatever the design.
though i certainly have my reservations about libeskind's design, especially the childs-ized version, the current design at least provides a solution that allows for a monumental and proud scale, while not just creating a ton of 'wasted' space. 40 stories of (relatively) non-profitable, public memorial space at the top of a building in one of the most expensive areas of the world is actually a very appropriate and even beautiful concept. it's the one piece of this whole catastrophe that says "maybe we aren't as materialistic and greedy as the world thinks we are". it's the one concept that actually "beats" the terrorists instead of reinforcing their ideologies and beliefs.
that said, i think that a simple park would demonstrate or realizes that concept at least as well. realistically though, i just don't see that happening in the sea of gross selfish greed that is this project.
See, het, that 40 stories at the top of the tower? I have a problem with it.....somebody (I don't know who, i'm sorry) once said that "it looked like a skeleton, and the last thing that Lower Manhattan needs is a skeleton built on that site". I kind of have to agree with this.
i've never seen the skeleton reference in the design myself. i've looked for it, but i just don't see it. but if it is there, i'd like it. it IS a site for skeletons, and we shouldn't forget that. and even before 9/11, i would have argued that a skeleton was exactly what downtown manhattan needs. in that case, to represent both those trampled by international corporate greed, of which lower manhattan is a nexus for, and to represent the empty shells of humanity that control that financial nexus.
pretty extreme there i know.. sorry. :)
Again, I am not upset about the design. I could truly care less. I am upset about what it means for architects. I am upset about what it means for our profession -- our jobs. I don't care about it in any philisophical or political way. Nor do I care about Libeskind or his design in any personal way.
I know developers rule the building world, but this is one of the few high profile **ARCHITECTURAL** projects left in this country. Probably the only one that everyone in this country is familiar with. To see the architect -- no matter who he may be -- tossed off as an out of touch egghead and then undermined by Trump, a self-centered, publicity hungry developer... well, I think it is a big deal. It affects all of us. It could affect our ability to get jobs and commissions for interesting projects. For me, this is about the reputation of architects and nothing else.
I am aware that many architects, for better or worse, have back ourselves into a corner where our primary service is "design". Design IS the last straw, and that is being undermined and taken away from us too. But ok, we'll let them have that too. Hell, what do I care, I'm going into real estate anyway :)
I can see tomorrow's NY Post story already:
Libeskind, YOU'RE FIRED!
Love to hear the passionate support for the architects and the profession, the ericharch is right on !!!
The thing is that architects are not the developers in this case, so we (they) just have to provide the best service for our(their) clients, the daniel design was probably the best service he could provide at that time, the trump is just in for publicity, i insist that there are only 2 viable possibilities:
one - letting the darth provide the design services,
two - form the Archinecters Design Group, and let us present our passionate design services, hell we'll do it better !!!
even more amazing.. that the general public would side with developers against architects, thinking that we're out of touch.. well, let me think, who's more out of touch? the architects who is (under)paid to represent and serve not only the client, but the public - or the developer who doesn't give a shite about anyone or anything but THEIR money?
where have you gone, john portman? to think, HE was the one we used to love to hate.
So, let me see if i have this right. First we have a situation as old as the profession itself...developer vs public art, artist vs cheapskate, etc...and the world wonders whey aren't playing nice over the most lucrative piece of land and architecture this nation has seen in over 100 years??? Anyone who thought that all the characters would play nicely is out of touch...and maybe thats what the final lesson of this project will be....to education the average person what a struggle it is to get a worthwhile building of magnitude constructed.
as for Trump...who the f^@* cares what this asshat has to say, anyway? it sounds to me like the group who has wanted a rebuilt-as-is-WTC-middle-finger-to-the-terrorists has finally found a proponent with a voice obnoxious enough to make their plight public. he may agree with the notion but probably just because its cheaper (read economical in trump-speak) to build. ONE STORY TALLER??? if this is a middle finger its a piddly one...oooohhhh so intimidating...another 12 feet taller....
i think the most important part of the post article hasn't been touched on...that being the rumor that the state could take over the site by emminent domain if Silverstein doesn't get his act together....if that could even happen, i'd love to see it. then i'm assuming some type of public forum could actually be used to discuss the issues at hand rather than have one man hold the purse strings...of course the downside to this is that everyone would balk at the cost and we'd get a watered down VE WTC anyway...so its a lose-lose... maybe the best thing is 'no building' and just the memorial. all this tarnished bickering isn't doing much for 'rememberance' or monumentality is it?
plus, wouldn't it be nice if the state did take control that they need someone who knows NYC real estate to guide the process...hmm...who's such a self-proclaimed good friend of Pataki??? lets look at Trump's real reasons for opening his mouth here, let alone for spending the money to commission a design and model.
Exactly Heterarchy... he will try to sell it to the public and steal the project by appealing to peoples raw emotions and sense of nostalgia for the towers. He is a great saleman.
It's pretty upsetting that a bunch of powergrabbing is going on at the site of the world's most visible graveyard.
Didn't we all just want to see something phenomenal there.....doesn't it deserve that? Something absolutely mind-boggling.....forward-thinking.....something that says, "yeah, 21st century, Ok, we're here now".
I wish they would kick them all off and start over.
i'm right with you there wonderk.
the real problem with this entire fiasco has been that every single player has made it into a personal crusade- what major player can we point who hasn't thought that this is the chance to shape their legacy? giuliani, pataki, bloomberg, libeskind, childs, doctoroff, silverstein and so on. trump's idea won't get built, we all know that, but at least maybe it will shake things up and make the public realize how completely backwards this has all become. it is extremely shameful how off target the whole process is. i see it as no threat to architects - some architect will be involved in this in the end since it is so visible. it IS a threat to libeskind and childs, but i see that as a blessing. at this point, i would be happier if brad cloepfil clad the former building design in terra cotta and glass than if the freedom tower were built.
can someone post an image when he releases it?
gawd, that grin and pose kill me. he looks like a toy.
This is starting to get good!!!
oi. i've been trying to reserve some respect for libeskind all this time, if nothing else because there's just NO one else in the process that i don't want to personally beat senseless. but that letter is a spineless cowardly piece of crap. it should have read something like, "go run some other project in to debt and ruin (as is your m.o.). if you'd like to register a complaint, here are two tickets to the gun show.. do you feel lucky, punk? do ya?"
he he he.
actually, i think Daniel had a pretty good zing in there about "the shape of one's head or its decorative accessory"...nice. this is petty, sure but you have to give the guy at least one 'atta-boy' for that line.
-nice comic, Steven!
i'll give him the atta boy for that line. i just wish he had stood up for himself and his part of the project - or more importantly for the profession of architecture, as opposed to focusing on shifting blame. from a professional standpoint, he only shifted the blame to another 'egg headed' architect. and along the lines of the original theme of this thread, the issue here is bigger than the individual architects. trump insulted the profession of architecture, and libeskind only reinforced the criticism. that's the part that i call spineless.
but yeah, that is a pretty clever line. :)
i agree het. blame shifters suck.
I don't see this as an attack on the proffesion, it is, if anything an attack on this whole debacle, remember trump only spoke up after the fact that pataki said they were reconsidering due to consultaion of the police...? whatever that means....i think it means they thought the design sucked...they are politicians so they can't say that... so they get trump to pipe up...trump being the publicity whore agrees...win win for all but danny and childs.....so what? a "starchitect" gets taken down a notch, his ego is big enough...he'll build somewhere else...some museum or something deserving of such sublime meaning......i think they should just make a park and min. memorial
think trump would call wright an egghead?
the wtc deserves sublime meaning but not in form but void
I don't know...I guess this is the "design" that Donald is behind according to NY1:
http://www.triroc.com/wtc/
"The Libeskind site plan (The New York Times) - a plan without meaning. The four new super skyscrapers are dark blue. With this plan, the terrorists win. "
this quote was on the site...this is taking it too far.....the terrorists wanted us to make "weird" architecture....so out of contexts...that pisses me off!
no matter what gets done on the site, it will be done in good faith - according to the best hopes of whoever comes out on top. trump making derogatory comments about a scheme, ugly or not, by saying 'the terrorists win' is just tacky and inappropriate.
trump...'tacky and inappropriate'...NO...say it isn't so...
i think the same could be said of pretty much every gold-lettered
self-named tower trump's put up in manhattan over the past
thirty or so years.
and steven i'd love to believe that this will get done in good faith
according to the best hopes of whomever..but this project has so
many hands in it, has so much politics wrapped around it and is
so overburdened by so many opinions (as well as the actual owner
of the site wanting to make some money at some point)..that i
can't see this project turning out as anything other than a muddled
mess of the initial vision that libeskind had...at best.
but maybe i'm jaded...i mean how does the nypd step in after
three years and send everyone back to the drawing board?
Yup, but it's a simple and effective strategy. The US has proven that anyone with power that says 'you are against ....blah blah blah .... terrorists win....blah blah balh" is believed.
Sad. I say fire them all! Make a pretty park that everyone will love, then have another competition open to everyone.
I find it ironically amusing that the buildings won't even rent. hasn't lower manhattan been something like 70% vacant for at least a decade?
I say, bring on the trump.
he's right - the freedom tower doesn't "look very good." It just doesn't.
And everybody out there who want ground zero to be a park - what a stunning lack of creativity you all have. Have you been there? - have you seen how big the hole is and how little urbanity exists around it? It would just be a dumb hole in the middle of downtown. The whole river's edge is already a park. NYC doesn't need more parks. Let's have a memorial in the old wtc footprints and then turn over the rest of the site to our real current needs. downtown needs energy, downtown needs commerce, downtown needs heterogeneity, downtown needs excitement. Lay down a grid manhattan style and let the speculation begin.
j-turn: i agree with you for the most part but a lot of voices are saying the rental demand is just not there, while dan doctoroff says silverstein is just charging too much for rent. i think that what a lot of people mean is not a big empty park but a park with the museum and performance hall.
Once again... This discussion is not about "looks" or design.
ericharch- this stuff happens all the time in arch. now because danny boy does'nt have much sack and is getting rolled over from every angle is the reason this looks so bad....sick'em nina
park with the museum and performance hall ... how PC: yawn!
It's new york ... we, er they, have the met, moma, guggi, whitney, lincoln center. .. etc. the city's not culturally deprived. but downtown is seriously lacking in some real new york city urbanity. all they have is wall st on one side - pure commercial/ office and battery park on the other side - pure residential. it would be interesting to use the wtc site to get some mixing going. stir the pot - create fabric, community - ahhh now i'm sounding all PC!
all this to say - well, i think trump is probably going the wrong way, but its all hella entertaining. Also very sad - especially when one takes a moment to remember the tragedy that motivated all of this sick vanity.
Am I the only one that has some seriously complicated emotions around the whole ground zero question?
Yes CalebRichers, this stuff does happen all the time in architecture. But when it does, it usually isn't written up on CNN and the NYT. And it usually doesn't involve a celebrity calling the architect an "egghead" with a bad design in the national media! Most importantly, it doesn't involve turning the nation against architects.
This is much bigger and much more important than the everyday occurances of architects getting screwed.
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