MODERN AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE

Manawatu Times, Volume LIV, Issue 6954, 6 July 1929, Page 6 (Supplement)

MODERN AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE

The Chrysler Building

•j-],,. ~u t concrete and steel foundations I '• r tho 68 story Chrysler Building at Forty-second Street and Lexington Avenue, in New York City, ha- been followed by the steady advance of the steel structure, bringing irto being a colossal black lace network which will dominate the midtown skylino until 1930. By that dale the granite, marble, and brick, wh'cli comprises the face of the buildin* will have covered it entirely. The f-co of the building will be made of blocks of Shastono granite, Georgia marble will be used as high as the filth floor, and from that poiut to the sixteenth floor and its cornice, there will be a basket weave pattern of Georgia marble and white-faced brick. From that point to the top of the building the construction will be brick of a special design, in greys and blacks, the black being used to accentuate the vertical lines of the structure. An interesting departure in skyscraper construction will be the copings and finials of cast aluminium. Spandrels between tho windows from tho nineteenth to the twenty-second floor will also bo of this material. Under the New York zoning laws, the setback of the building was fixed ar, one to four. Sixteen stories, measuring 182 feet are without setback. The first setback is IS feet on the next seventeen stories. The main volume of the building is 56 stories, including the tower, while the dome is 12 stories. A utilisation of the automobile itself as a motif in the design of the Chrysler Building in a frieze at the 30th. story marks a departure in modern architecture. In conventionalised design the whole profile of a limousine, showing body lines, fenders, and wheels will bo depicted in sharply contrasting white, grey and black brick. The hub caps on the wheels will bo of aluminium, 1-1 inches in diameter. The frieze will terminate in a finial at the four corners, where 10ft. long Chrysler wings will stand out against the skies of Manhattan.

The dome of the building starts in octoganal form, finally receding to the summit in proper dome formation. It will be easily distinguished on the sky line, being the only object of its particular size and shape. The spire at the top of the dome is in the form of a great star with thirty points. Flood lights, cleverly arranged behind the ray-lilce decorations which spread out from the dome at regular intervals, will play brilliant lights on the shining aluminium. The spring of 1930 will see the Chrysler Building completed—a new business mccca in the heart of the business world.