World Trade Center cultural building designed to float and disappear

World Trade Center cultural building designed to float and disappear
New York State leaders and the
Lower Manhattan Development
Corporation (LMDC) unveiled a
schematic design for the first of
two cultural buildings at the World
Trade Center site on May 19. The
building, designed by Norwegian
firm Snøhetta, will house New York’s
Drawing Center and a new museum
called the International Freedom
Center. Frank Gehry is designing a
performing arts center that would be
located across the street to the north.
The Snøhetta building, which
will sit on the northeast corner of
the Trade Center Memorial’s plaza,
has been designed to minimize
interference with the memorial. In
contrast to the planned 1,776-foot
Freedom Tower, the cultural center
(whose square footage is not yet
determined) would be a low, horizontal
building, with clear sight lines
from Greenwich Street, to its east,
to the memorial on the west. Its
ethereal surface, whose primary
materials were not disclosed, will be
covered with glass prisms.
Snøhetta principal Kjetil Thorsen
explained the “tabletop design” for
the structure, developed with Buro
Happold engineers’ New York office,
whereby the bulk of the building
would be hung from a supporting
structure at its roof. That structure,
in turn, would be supported at its
corners. A processional ramp would
lead visitors up from ground level to
the exhibition and auditorium spaces
above. Thorsen’s Snøhetta partner,
Craig Dykers, said that the architects
worked with the Freedom Center
and Drawing Center in biweekly
workshops over a 90-day period.
The Drawing Center is the only
nonprofit organization in the country
that focuses on the medium of
drawing. The International Freedom
Center will tell “freedom’s story,”
according to its mission statement,
including “a multimedia collage of
some of freedom’s most inspiring
moments, as well as galleries and
temporary exhibits.”
New York’s Mayor Michael
Bloomberg attempted to preempt
criticism from the families of
September 11 victims by compli-
menting “a design that integrates
the memorial, and is respectful of
the buildings around it.” But some
9/11 family members didn’t accept
such reassurances.
Anthony Gardner, chairman of
the World Trade Center United Family
Group, thinks the Freedom Center’s
program is too close to that of the
memorial’s 9/11 museum, and will
upstage the memorial. “The rhetoric
says that the memorial is the centerpiece,
but the reality is it’s an
afterthought. We’re opposed to any
plans to locate a non-memorialrelated
building within the 4-acre
memorial quadrant.” Gardner feels
that if Snøhetta’s building were a
September 11 museum, “that’s a
different story, but our center is relegated
to being underground. I feel
it’s an attempt to sanitize the site,
to make it more attractive for the
office buildings.”
New York’s Governor George
Pataki, who has been under fire for
delays at the World Trade Center
site, announced a timeline for the
cultural center and for other buildings
at the site. He says that new
plans for the Freedom Tower, which
is being redesigned to address
safety concerns, would be presented
at the end of June. This
summer, construction will begin on
the Santiago Calatrava–designed
PATH terminal. Crews will break
ground to build the memorial plaza
itself in 2006, and the cultural center
will break ground in 2007. No
budget has been announced for the
cultural center. Kevin Lerner