Skyscraper Museum

Skyscraper Museum interior view

World Trade Center architectural model on exhibit at the museum

The Skyscraper Museum is an architecture museum located in Battery Park City, Manhattan, New York City and founded in 1996.^[1] As the name suggests, the museum focuses on high-rise buildings as "products of technology, objects of design, sites of construction, investments in real estate, and places of work and residence." The Skyscraper Museum also celebrates the architectural heritage of New York and the forces and people who created New York's skyline.^[2] Before moving to the current and permanent location in Battery Park City in 2004, the museum was a nomadic institution, holding pop-up exhibitions in four temporary donated spaces around Lower Manhattan since 1996.

The Skyscraper Museum was founded and is directed by Carol Willis, a professor of architectural history and urban studies at Columbia University.^[3] It includes two exhibition spaces for both permanent and temporary exhibitions, a bookstore, and a mezzanine with its office, situated above the bookstore. The museum can be reached by a ramp starting in the basement.^[2]

Move after September 11, 2001

The original site of the museum was located very close to the World Trade Center. After the September 11 attacks, the museum was forced to close temporarily as its space was commandeered as an emergency information center.^[4]

In March 2004, the museum reopened in its new permanent home at 39 Battery Park Place in the neighbourhood of Battery Park City at the southern tip of Manhattan.^[3] It was the first museum to open in Lower Manhattan after the September 11 attacks. The museum occupies an area of 5,800-square-foot (540 m²) on the ground-floor of a mixed-use building, that was donated by the developer.^[2] The new site was designed by Roger Duffy of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, working pro bono.^[3] The architect tried to amplify the indoor height of the museum, which is 10-foot (3.0 m). This was arranged by using polished covers of stainless steel on the floors and ceilings, giving the illusion of an infinite vertical space.^[2]

Selected exhibitions

On September 6, 2006, the museum opened an exhibit on the construction and history of the World Trade Center. The exhibit includes the original architectural/engineering model of the World Trade Center.^[5]

On June 24, 2009, the museum opened China Prophecy: Shanghai, a multi-media exhibition that examines Shanghai's evolving identity as a skyscraper metropolis. Featuring models of the major iconic structures, including Jin Mao, Tomorrow Square, Shanghai World Financial Center, and the new super-tall Shanghai Tower, as well as computer animations, film, drawings, and historic and contemporary photography of the city, the exhibition combines an in-depth look at the new generation of towers with an overview of the sweeping transformation of the city’s traditional low-rise landscape into a city of towers.

In 2011, the Skyscraper Museum opened a new exhibit called "Supertall!" dedicated to the tallest buildings in the world, those that stand at least 381 metres (1,250 ft), the height of the Empire State Building. The exhibit features qualifying buildings built since 2001 to those that will be built by 2016 as a commemoration of and to demonstrate the irony of the recent popularity of the skyscraper in many countries, despite sentiment that after 9/11 there would be no more desire to live or work in or to build skyscrapers.^[6]

Besides in-house exhibitions, the museum also sponsors external shows and programs at various locations in the city. Additionally, the museum offers a unique virtual gallery through its website, which is an advanced 3-D archive of Manhattan skyscrapers.

Additional reading

Filler, Martin (April 2015). New York: Conspicuous Construction. A discussion of Sky High and the Logic of Luxury - an exhibition at the Skyscraper Museum, New York City, October 2013 – June 2014. The New York Review of Books

References

↑ Iovine, Julie V. (May 5, 1997). "A Natural for New York: A Skyscraper Museum". New York Times. Retrieved October 15, 2009.
1 2 3 4 Hill, John. Guide to Contemporary New York City Architecture. New York and London: W.W. Norton & Company. p. 21. ISBN 978-0-393-73326-6.
1 2 3 Iovine, Julie V. (February 29, 2004). "A Tiny Museum Achieves Its Towering Ambition". New York Times. Retrieved October 15, 2009.
↑ Iovine, Julie V. (September 27, 2001). "Designers Look Beyond Debris". New York Times. Retrieved October 15, 2009.
↑ "Museum exhibit traces history of World Trade Center's twin towers". International Herald Tribune. Associated Press. September 4, 2006.
↑ Gardner, James (16 August 2011). "Heights of Fancy". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 16 August 2011.

External links

Museums in Manhattan

Current	American Academy of Arts and Letters American Folk Art Museum American Museum of Natural History Rose Center for Earth and Space Asia Society Asian American Arts Centre Castle Clinton Center for Jewish History Children's Museum of Manhattan China Institute The Cloisters Drawing Center Dyckman House El Museo del Barrio Eldridge Street Synagogue Ellis Island Federal Hall National Memorial Fraunces Tavern Frick Collection FusionArts Museum George Gustav Heye Center Girl Scout Museum and Archives Gracie Mansion Grolier Club Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Hamilton Grange National Memorial Hispanic Society of America International Center of Photography International Print Center New York Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum Irish American Baseball Hall of Fame Japan Society Jewish Museum John J. Harvey John M. Mossman Lock Museum Lower East Side Tenement Museum Madame Tussauds Malcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazz Memorial and Educational Center Merchant's House Museum Met Breuer Metropolitan Museum of Art Mmuseumm Morgan Library & Museum Morris–Jumel Mansion Mount Vernon Hotel Museum The Museum at FIT Museum of American Finance Museum of Arts and Design Museum of Biblical Art Museum of Chinese in America Museum of Jewish Heritage Museum of Mathematics Museum of Modern Art Museum of Motherhood Museum of Primitive Art Museum of Sex Museum of the City of New York National Academy Museum and School National Jazz Museum in Harlem National Track and Field Hall of Fame Neue Galerie New York New Museum New York City Fire Museum New York City Police Museum New York Public Library New York Public Library for the Performing Arts New York Transit Museum New-York Historical Society Paley Center for Media Nicholas Roerich Museum Rose Museum Rubin Museum of Art Scandinavia House Skyscraper Museum South Street Seaport Museum Statue of Liberty Studio Museum in Harlem The Theatre Museum Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace Tibet House Ukrainian Museum United Nations Art Collection Whitney Museum of American Art Yeshiva University Museum

Defunct	Chelsea Art Museum Dahesh Museum of Art Forbes Galleries Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art

See also: Museum Mile

Coordinates: 40°42′20″N 74°1′3″W / 40.70556°N 74.01750°W / 40.70556; -74.01750

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