top ten world architecture- Past 100 Years

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Top Ten World Architecture

top ten architecture past 100 years

For a more complete list, see Top Ten World Architecture

1905 to 1910 : Casa Mila Barcelona

architect	Antoni Gaudi
location	Barcelona
date	1905 to 1910
style	Art Nouveau
construction	concrete
type	House

Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi defied rigid geometry when he designed Casa Mila Barcelona. Casa Mila Barcelona is an apartment building with a fanciful aura. Wavy walls seem to undulate and a comical array of chimney stacks dance across the roof. "The straight line belongs to men, the curved one to God," Gaudi asserted.

1913 : Grand Central Terminal, New York

architect	Reed & Stem, Warren & Wetmore
location	42nd Street and 3rd Ave.
date	1903-1913
style	Beaux-Arts
construction	stone facade
type	Utility

Grand Central Terminal (GCT, often inaccurately called Grand Central Station) is a Terminal station at 42nd Street and Park Avenue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. Built by and named for the New York Central Railroad in the heyday of American long-distance passenger trains, it is the largest train station in the world by number of platforms:[3] 44, with 67 tracks along them. They are on two levels, both below ground, with 41 tracks on the upper level and 26 on the lower.

It serves commuters traveling on the Metro-North Railroad to Westchester, Putnam, and Dutchess counties in New York State, and Fairfield and New Haven counties in Connecticut.

Although it has been properly called "Grand Central Terminal" since 1913, many people continue to refer to it as "Grand Central Station". Technically, that is the name of the nearby post office, as well as the name of a previous rail station on the site.

1930 : The Chrysler Building, New York

architect	William Van Alen
location	405 Lexington Avenue at 42^nd Street
date	1928-1930
style	Art Deco
construction	77 floors, 319.5m (1048 feet) high, 29961 tons of steel, 3,826,000 bricks, near 5000 windows. Cost: $ 20,000,000 The building is clad in white brick and dark gray brickwork is used as horizontal decoration to enhance the window rows. The eccentric crescent-shaped steps of the spire (spire scaffolding) were made of stainless steel (or rather, similar nirosta chrome-nickel steel) as a stylized sunburst motif, and underneath it steel gargoyles, depicting American eagles (image), stare over the city. Sculptures modeled after Chrysler automobile radiator caps (image) decorate the lower setbacks, along with ornaments of car wheels. The three stories high, upwards tapering entrance lobby has a triangular form, with entrances from three sides, Lexington Avenue, 42nd and 43rd Streets. The lobby is lavishly decorated with Red Moroccan marble walls, sienna-coloured floor and onyx, blue marble and steel in Art Deco compositions. The ceiling murals, painted by Edward Trumbull, praise the modern-day technical progress -- and of course the building itself and its builders at work. The lobby was refurbished in 1978 by JCS Design Assocs. and Joseph Pell Lombardi.
type	Office Building
	Click here for Chrysler Building gallery

The Chrysler Building is an Art Deco skyscraper in New York City, located on the east side of Manhattan at the intersection of 42nd Street and Lexington Avenue. Standing at 319 m (1,047 ft) high,[1] it was briefly the world's tallest building before it was surpassed by the Empire State Building in 1931. However, the Chrysler Building remains the world's tallest brick building.[2][3] After the destruction of the World Trade Center, it was again the second tallest building in New York City until December 2007, when the spire was raised on the 365.8 m (1,200 ft) Bank of America building, pushing the Chrysler Building into third position. In addition, the New York Times Building, which opened in 2007, is exactly tied with the Chrysler Building in height, making the two buildings tied for 3rd position.[4] Despite the change in tallness ranking in New York, the Chrysler Building is still a classic example of Art Deco architecture and considered by many, at least among contemporary architects, to be one of the finest buildings in New York City.

1931 : Empire State Building, New York

architect	Shreve, Lamb & Harmon, William F. Lamb as chief designer
location	350 Fifth Ave., bet. W33 and W34
date	1930-1931
style	Art Deco
construction	Steel frame 102 floors, 1252 feet, 381 meters high. Effective use of setbacks to emphasize tower. The building is clad in Indiana limestone and granite, with the mullions lined in shiny aluminium. There are in all 6,500 windows, with spandrels sandblasted to blend their tone to that of the windows, visually creating the vertical striping on the facade. The windows and spandrels are also flush with the limestone facing, an aesthetic and economic decision.
type	Office Building
	Click here for an Empire State Building gallery

The Empire State Building is a 102-story Art Deco skyscraper in New York City, New York at the intersection of Fifth Avenue and West 34th Street. Its name is derived from the nickname for the state of New York. It stood as the world's tallest building for more than forty years, from its completion in 1931 until construction of the World Trade Center's North Tower was completed in 1972. Following the destruction of the World Trade Center in 2001, the Empire State Building became for the second time, the tallest building in New York City.
The Empire State Building has been named by the American Society of Civil Engineers as one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World. The building and its street floor interior are designated landmarks of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, and confirmed by the New York City Board of Estimate.[5] It was designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1986.[3][6][7] In 2007, it was ranked number one on the List of America's Favorite Architecture according to the AIA. The building is owned by Harold Helmsley's company and managed by its management/leasing division Helmsley-Spear.

1935 : Kaufmann Residence (Fallingwater) , Pennsylvania, USA

architect	Frank Lloyd Wright
location	Bear Run, PA
date	1935
style	Prairie School
construction	cantilevered reinforced concrete
type	House

Frank Lloyd Wright fooled gravity when he designed Fallingwater. What seems to be a loose pile of concrete slabs threatens to topple from its cliff. The house is not really precarious, but visitors are still awed by the improbable structure.

1936 - 1939 : Johnson Wax Administration Building, Racine, WI

architect	Frank Lloyd Wright
location	Racine, WI
date	1936-39
style	Art Moderne
construction	Brick
type	Office Building

Frank Lloyd Wright redefined space with the Johnson Wax Building in Racine, Wisconsin. Inside the Johnson Wax Building, opaque layers of glass tubes admit light and create the illusion of openness. "Interior space comes free," Wright said of his masterpiece. Wright also designed the original furniture for the building. Some chairs had only three legs, and would tip over if a forgetful secretary did not sit with correct posture.

1946 - 1950 : Farnsworth house, Plano, IL

architect	Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
location	Plano, IL
date	1945-51 (W:1946-50)
style	Early Modern
construction	steel and glass
type	House

Hovering in a green landscape, the Farnsworth House by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe is often celebrated as his most perfect expression of the International Style. All the exterior walls are glass.

1957 - 1973 : Sydney Opera House , Australia

architect	1957-63 Joern Utzon (Stage 1) 1963-73 (NSWGA), Hall Todd & Littlemore (Stage 2) - interiors and glass walls) Engineers: Ove Arup & Partners
location	Bennelong Point (on the site previously)
date	1957-73
style	Late 20th-Century Structuralist
construction	reinforced concrete, white tiles 65 m 213 ft
type	Theater

Jorn Utzon broke the rules with his modern expressionist Sidney Opera House in Australia. Overlooking the harbor, the Opera House is a freestanding sculpture of spherical roofs and curved shapes. A scandalous political affair forced architect John Utzon to withdraw from the project in 1966. The Opera house was completed by other designers under the direction of Peter Hall.

1958 : The Seagram Building , New York

architect	Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Philip Johnson (interiors) and Kahn & Jacobs
location	375 Park Ave. (at 53rd Street)
date	1958
style	International Style II
construction	The plan of the building is based on a 8.50 m grid, pursued to unprecedented Miesian accuracy. The elevator core is placed to the back of the building, forming the protruding, windowless back wall of the tower. Set on bronze-clad pillars, the 38-storey facade consists of alternating bands of bronze plating and "whisky brown"-tinted glass (the material and colour choices were a result of Bronfman's insistance of having a warmer-toned facade than in the Lake Shore Drive Apts). The building was, notably, the first with floor-to-ceiling windows, making the wall a true curtain of glass, as foreseen by the visionaries of Modern Movement, like Mies himself. Between the windows, there are vertical decorative bronze I-profiled beams attached to the mullions to emphasize the vertical rise of the facade. Van der Rohe personally stated that this was his only building in the United States which met exactly his European standards.
type	Office Building

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Philip Johnson rejected "bourgeois" ornamentation when they designed the Seagram Building in New York City. A shimmering tower of glass and bronze, the Seagram Building is both classical and stark. Metallic beams emphasize the height of the 38-story skyscraper, while a base of granite pillars leads to horizontal bands of bronze plating and bronze-tinted glass.

1970 - 1977 : World Trade Center, New York (Demolished by terrorist attacks)

architect	Minoru Yamasaki
location	Church to West Streets, Liberty to Vesey Streets
date	1966-70 (Destroyed 2001).
style	International Style II
construction
type	Office Building

Designed by Minoru Yamasaki, New York's World Trade consisted of two 110-story buildings (known as the "Twin Towers") and five smaller buildings. Soaring above the New York skyline, the Twin Towers were among the tallest buildings in the world. When the buildings were constructed, their design was often criticized, but in the aftermath of their destruction, they became a valuable part of America's cultural heritage.