Freedom Tower

This new design for the Freedom Tower at the World Trade Center site was unveiled on Dec. 19, 2003. The signature skyscraper would be the tallest in the world. The design is by architect Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP.

Graceful Spire

This is a night view of the proposed Freedom Tower. The new design gracefully slopes into a spire rising 1,776 feet, echoing the Statue of Liberty. The tower would include 70 stories of office space and a 276-foot spire and would be topped by broadcast antennas.

Going Downtown

This is an artist's rendering of a view of the proposed Freedom Tower, background center, as seen from the north. At left is the Chrysler Building; the Empire State Building is at right.

In The Moonlight

This is an artist's rendering of a night view of the proposed Freedom Tower, center, as seen from the south at night. At left are the Empire State Building and Statue of Liberty.

View From Brooklyn

This is an artist's rendering of a view of the proposed Freedom Tower, right, with the the Brooklyn Bridge in foreground.

The new plan followed months of contentious negotiations between designers Daniel Libeskind, pictured here in February 2003, and David Childs. It retains many elements of Libeskind's original plan but appears to smooth out its most angular elements.

Architect Daniel Libeskind, World Trade Center lease owner Larry Silverstein and architect Daniel Childs, from left to right, Oct. 30, 2003. Libeskind was originally tapped as the architect to remake ground zero by the Lower Manhattan Development Corp., the agency charged with redevelopment. Childs was appointed by Silverstein to collaborate on changes to the tower.

The Original Tower

This is a sketch of Libeskind's original plan for the rebuilt World Trade Center site. For the new design, Childs succeeded in including a lattice structure filled with energy-generating windmills at the top of the building. He likened the suspension elements of the new design to the Brooklyn Bridge, with the bottom of the building "torqued or twisted."

Architect David Childs, left,looks at a model of the design for the Freedom Tower to be built on the World Trade Center site during an unveiling ceremony in Federal Hall, New York, Dec. 19, 2003. With Childs are, from left, New York Gov. George Pataki, World Trade Center leaseholder Larry Silverstein and architect Daniel Libeskind.
Click here to see the plans for the entire site.