CityLab Daily: The Legacy of the Twin Towers
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Dismissed early on by critics as effeminate, the Twin Towers, shown here at sunset in 1979, came to be seen as an inimitable New York landmark.
Photographer: Santi Visalli/Archive PhotosThe Twin Towers once seemed to stand for New York City itself, instantly recognizable and never to be imitated. When the buildings fell 20 years ago, New Yorkers came to remember them as symbols of resilience. But the towers were not always so universally praised.
After the buildings’ completion in 1973, critics panned architect Minoru Yamasaki’s design as lacking strength. “Daintiness” was the charge levied by one venerated architecture critic, a characteristic response to Yamasaki’s modernist architecture.