Newsday from New York, New York • 115

rw i it' -rf i -k nr-ii: v' iVf v-'1 ij'ivs dnfiira 'xi' -d- SV -i J' New midtown skrape and The Times aim to rise above the ordinary IT fc rvrs-V' -355 1 s3 ('I' FOSTt AND PARTNERS PHOTO The Hearst Tower spins mother hind of rtmatrfrpl illusion: the effect of one era's modem architecture giving birth to another's Foster's crystal rocket will rise out of a squat six-story structure built in 1928 for the corporation founded by William Randolph Hearst The architect and set designer Joseph Urban gave MTIFACTOIIY AND ANDY GORDON PHOTOGRAPHY THE TIMES TOWER above by Renzo Piano will be a symbol of openness and transparency at Eighth Avenue and 42nd Street: stories sheathed in glass and a veil of ceramic tubing below BY JUSTIN DAVIDSON STAFF WRITER 1 towers that Jmikeupthe midtown Manhaf-tan skyline area motley bunch In among die ningant needle of the Empire State the twinkling chrome cap of the Chrysler Building and the runaway-truck ramp of Citicorp is a chorus line of undistinguished slabs The -ensemble constantly yet die stars remain the same Two projects that for now exist mostly on paper hold promise ashigh-rise heart-throbs: Kenzo New York Times Tower poised for the corner of Eighth Avenue and 42nd Street and Norman Foster's Hearst Tower already going up at Eighth and 56th Both will one day reach out to paasersby and demand a strong opinion rather than just a glazed nod The Times Tower a 'sheathed in a see-through veil of ceramic tubes is designed to disappear An actual 52-story iky-semper rarely looks as gossamer as it does in models and renderings but here lightness is both a metaphoric and an architectural goal The Times wants a symbol of its journalistic values and die qualities of an ideal democracy openness Integrity transparency Piano wants a struc- ture that doesn't glower be-hind dark glass like a highway patrolman wearing shades Instead he has imagined a self-effacing edifice that will shimmer and dissolve as it rises to a slender needle: To achieve that mistiness Wmn to fPflnM each floor in nntinted nitrmlear low-iron glass then wrap it in i a coat of white rods which will deflect beat and glare The veil of rods continues upward well beyond the top story makingit look as though the shroud were being plucked skyward by a heavenly hand HEARST TOWER at Eighth and 56th will have 42 stories the roofline topped with pre- ous architectural that seem to float above carious Art Deco urns It that would reflect public the original Hearst building looked unfinished and it was: character of our publications" supported by a "diagrid" of The Depression squelched What he wanted in other external beams Design is by Hearsf plan to erect a words was a work of architec- Foster and Partners high-rise on top of it tural branding which his wanted something which namesake corporation still 1 had qualities of the theater and desires the International Magazine where sculpture was an impor- More than 70 years later Building as it was grandiosely tant Hearst cabled Foster has responded to called a wanly heroic touch Urban in 1927 His headquar with columns that reach past ten should display See TOWER on C28 i.