Nouvel Note

Just a quick note on Jean Nouvel's latest design for Manhattan, a new 75-story tower for a site next to the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in Midtown. Nicolai Ouroussoff asks, "How did a profit-driven developer become more adventurous architecturally than MoMA, which has tended to make cautious choices in recent years?"



He answers his own question in with:

Hines [who MoMA sold the site to] asked Mr. Nouvel to come up with two possible designs for the site. A decade ago anyone who was about to invest hundreds of millions on a building would inevitably have chosen the more conservative of the two. But times have changed. Architecture is a form of marketing now, and Hines made the bolder choice.

(via Archinect)