Black Rock, CBS Inc., originally uploaded by shanan.
This is one of the first modern buildings that I was told that I had to bow down to-- for me, it was initially more about the power of CBS when it was built in 1965. But I've since come to respect its elegance.
From the Midtown Book by Carter Horsley:
In midtown Manhattan, the "Black Rock," as this headquarters building of CBS is popularly known, has befuddled and confounded architecture critics since its inception.
Is it great architecture or bad urbanism?
Like most real-life either/or questions, it isn't that simple.
This 38-story, sheer, freestanding tower set in its own shallow sunken plaza is unquestionably great architecture because it is original, consistent, boldly expressed and daring. Initially, some observers did not like its dark coloration, and considered sunken plazas anathema and its aloofness rather condescending and disrespectful of the common man, that is, the pedestrian. These attributes, however, were not really negatives given its context of fronting on an avenue whose smile then displayed many broken and missing teeth because of the existing irregular pattern of nearby public plazas. Moreover, its context along the Avenue of the Americas was generally undistinguished design.
The CBS Building's proportions and rhythmic facades are, in fact, far better than those of the celebrated Seagram Building across town on Park Avenue. This is a powerful building, whose angled piers thrust skyward with great energy, assertively expressing its dynamic structuralism in a manner that makes the Seagram Building almost seem dainty and frail. An important key to its cohesive expression is the equal division of its facades into five-foot-wide sections of piers and large, vertical, single-pane windows. Simplicity and focus are this building's bywords.
nostalgia?
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