Farayand Virtual World

* USA Evoking Freedom

The Freedom Tower – a twisting, shimmering, glass-encased skyscraper topped by a spire evocative of the Statue of Liberty, will soon fill in the vacuum created by the collapsed World Trade centre towers. The design follows months of wrangling between the original winner of the design competition, architects Daniel Libeskind and the leaseholder of the WTC site.

The building is proposed to be the world’s tallest cable-framed, open –air, windmill-filed, spire studded superstructure rising atop 70 storeys of offices, restaurants, a broadcast centre and an observation deck.

Canada Royal Metamorphosis

The Royal Ontario Museum’s (ROM) new ‘Michael. A. Lee-Chin Crystal Building’ will open in December 2005. Designed by Daniel Libeskind, the Crystal contains a large new main entrance lobby and retail space, an 18.000 ft2 international exhibition hall, six spacious new permanent galleries for palaeobiology, world cultures, textiles and contemporary culture, and a panoramic new restaurant.

The Renaissance ROM project also includes extensive renovations to the museum’s heritage buildings including expansive new galleries for the ROM’s signature Canadian and East Asian collections. The entire project will provide over 220.000 ft2 of new and renovated space by December 2006.
(Architecture of a new world)