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Feb 17, 2014 · Written by Michelle Miller. Share. The Woolworth Building, an innovative and elegant early skyscraper completed in 1913, endures today as an iconic form on the New York City skyline. A historicist...
- The New Skyline
- World’S Tallest
- Gargoyles
Given the colossal buildings that now cover downtown Manhattan, it can be hard to understand just how distinctive Cass Gilbert’s Woolworth Building appeared in relation to the skyline when it was new, one hundred years ago. Skyscrapers emerged in Chicago the 1880s as a way to concentrate commercial office functions within the limited space downtown...
Gilbert utilized the most advanced steel-frame construction techniques of the time allowing the Woolworth to sound 57 stories to 792 feet — the world’s tallest building until 1930. In contrast to the relative horizontality of Chicago skyscrapers and the sharp divisions between base and tower of earlier New York skyscrapers like the Singer Building ...
The building’s decorative neo-Gothic program only adds to this sense of monumentality. On the exterior, ornate sculptural arches, finials, and gargoyles over-scaled enough to be read from street-level, refer directly to European medieval architecture, and draw the eye towards the heavens in the same manner as a High Gothic cathedral. Inside the bui...
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Gilbert utilized the most advanced steel-frame construction techniques of the time allowing the Woolworth to soar 57 stories to 792 feet—the world’s tallest building until 1930.
With a career that spanned nearly a half century, Cass Gilbert helped reinterpret classical design elements for the American vernacular, creating Neo-Gothic skyscrapers and American Revival...
Cass Gilbert (November 24, 1859 – May 17, 1934) was an American architect. An early proponent of skyscrapers, his works include the Woolworth Building, the United States Supreme Court building, the state capitols of Minnesota, Arkansas, and West Virginia, the Detroit Public Library, the Saint Louis Art Museum and Public Library.
- Architect
- November 24, 1859, Zanesville, Ohio, U.S.
- President, American Institute of Architects, 1908–09
Since its existence, this building remains to be one of the tallest and the most iconic buildings in the world. Apart from giving an amazing skyline to New York City, Woolworth screams of typical classic design and portrays the timeless Manhattan architecture. Designed by architect Cass Gilbert this American skyscraper consists of a 30-storey ...
While in practice in St. Paul during the 1880s, Gilbert followed Chicago's breakthroughs in the design and construction of skyscrapers. When Woolworth selected Gilbert to design his tower in April 1910, he had in his portfolio only two New York City high-rises. He was renowned instead for his institutional buildings, including the monumental U ...
