Without question this building is
one of the icons of 1930s architecture.
When it was completed in 1931, it was the
World's tallest building, a title it held for
the next
41 years until, in 1972, the World Trade Center
claimed that honour. Whilst it retains its
iconic status as an art deco masterpiece, its
original claim to fame has been well and truly
put into the shade. Standing 2,722 feet
high Dubai's "Burj Khalifa" tower is more than
two and a half times higher that the Empire
State Building. In this case height
matters because one of the goals of the
commission for the Empire State Building was to
make it New York's tallest building and
certainly to out do the Chrysler Tower.
The building was constructed of
60,000 tons of steel.
Three thousand construction workers are said
to have been involved in the project
including, famously, a group of Mohawks, from
Kahnawake near Montreal, who erected the high
steel framework. The building was clad
in 200,000 cubic feet of Indiana limestone and
granite and 10 million bricks.
Apparently, the design of the building went
through a number of revisions along the
way. It is said that at one point there
was even a plan to use the spire at the top as a
mooring mast for dirigibles but that idea was
abandoned along with others. The Empire
State Building was opened officially on May 1,
1931.
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