MADHOUSE: Ground Zero designers at war

NY Post ^ | 12/11/03 | WILLIAM NEUMAN

[finnman69]

December 11, 2003 -- The fight over the Ground Zero Freedom Tower has spiraled completely out of control, with accusations of a "Watergate break-in" and bitter feuding between the two key architects, sources said yesterday.

The collaboration between World Trade Center master planner Daniel Libeskind and David Childs, the architect for developer Larry Silverstein, is on the verge of breaking down and the pair are not even speaking.

[finnman69]

The disaster continues. Liebskind crossed the line by bringing a lawyer in, and raiding SOM's office is unthinkable to me.

[theDentist]

"Can't we all just get along?"

[petercooper]

Rebuild the towers exactly the way they were. Forget about this new age artsey crap.

[finnman69]

WTC ping

[Pan_Yans Wife]

To rebuild them would mean that a great deal of the office space would go un-rented. And Manhattan needs the revenue. Better to make them smaller, and full.

The designs themselves are a different matter. Different does not necessarily mean artistic or inspiring.

[dead]

Drama queens and petulant bitches.

[areafiftyone]

Thanks for the ping. Disgusting egotists. They would have been better off just getting the original architect of the towers to build brand new ones.

[Bubba_Leroy]

This is still my favorite of all of the proposed redesigns:

[mr.pink]

Liebskind should be chased out of town. He has allowed what is perhaps the most important architectural project of our lifetimes to degenerate into an embarrassingly adolescent ego-driven food fight.

From the day this little (and I do mean little) brat picked up his pencils, this has not been about rebuilding ground zero, but rather about him rebuilding ground zero. It seems that in his mind, he is bigger than this project. IMO the task at hand is way too important to be even tangentially associated with scum like him.

Let actual grown ups, with a true sense of dignity, taste, and humility handle this. If that means back to square one, so be it.

[finnman69]

From the day this little (and I do mean little) brat picked up his pencils, this has not been about rebuilding ground zero, but rather about him rebuilding ground zero. It seems that in his mind, he is bigger than this project.

100% correct in your assessment of Libeskind. David Childs has a huge ego as well, but at least he is a professional and does not engage in the PR/drama queen garbage that Libeskind does.

[Mr. Jeeves]

Libeskind is in the right - his design is being mangled - but he's approaching this the wrong way. He should pull a Howard Roark and simply bow out, refusing to do any more work on the project and forbidding any of his designs to be used.

[bmwcyle]

That gets my vote.

[petercooper]

make them 1/2 residential, 1/2 commercial

[NYC GOP Chick]

Great, but not surprising. It's going to remain a g-damn hole in the ground forever. That's what the islamofascists, the leftists, the America-haters, the NYC-haters and the weepy portion of victims' families all want.

[finnman69]

It would be hard to mangle Libeskind's mangled designs any more than they originally were. I'm praying Libeskind resigns or is fired.

[Arkinsaw]

Libeskind wants a building with an angular, asymmetrical top roughly similar to pictures in his master plan, evoking the upraised torch of the Statue of Liberty.

This is why I have favored Libeskind's design since the start. The first time I saw it I thought about how important it was that the sight evoke patriotism rather than just death. Libeskind's was the only design that incorporated patriotic symbolism. The tower matches with the Statue of Liberty beautifully. Too bad it will never be.

[mr.pink]

David Childs has a huge ego as well, but at least he is a professional and does not engage in the PR/drama queen garbage that Libeskind does.

Most greats possess large egos (it's part of what gives them the confidence to reach grandly), but the truly great understand when the circumstances call for checking it at the door.

This is that sort of circumstance IMO.

[FeliciaCat]

And I thought the Film Industry had the biggest egomaniacs....sheesh.

[PianoMan]

Childs is a bottom feeding parasite. He designed the worst of the worst of the early designs for the center and was widely ridiculed, then Silverstein gave everyone the finger and installed him to build Liebeskind's project anyway. He started changing it immediately. Left to his own devices he would turn this into a bland office park.

Libeskind's design should stand, and he has a right to insist on it.

[TheBattman]

I still stick to my assertion that the idiots who designed all of the "official" entries for the design were tasteless dolts. The best design I have seen of all, including un-official entires:

http://phoenixi.com/