“The architect who won the competition to rebuild on New York’s Ground Zero has revealed how the process degenerated into bitter feuds and childish squabbles among rival designers – though he rejects the notion that the new plan for the site is an uninspiring compromise.
In a candid new book, Breaking Ground, Daniel Libeskind recounts what he calls his ‘forced marriage’ to David Childs, the favoured architect of the World Trade Centre site’s developer, Larry Silverstein.
He portrays Mr Childs as patronising and overbearing, and intent on eliminating as much of Mr Libeskind’s vision as possible from the eventual design…
Since winning the competition last year, Mr Libeskind, designer of the Jewish Museum in Berlin, has been fighting to preserve what he can of his original concept, which had as its centrepiece a Freedom Tower, 1,776 feet high, to represent the date of the American declaration of independence. That symbolic height has been maintained, and the tower’s cornerstone was laid in July.”
More here from The Guardian.