The Freedom Tower

Salon.com says that Tower 7 seems to be a monument to grace. Those are Salon’s words not mine. “The original 47-story granite-and-glass building that stood across Vesey Street from the Trade Towers disappeared into the ground at 5:21 p.m. on 9/11. The new tower, which opened in May, is an elegant glass parallelogram that now dominates ground zero.
“Like the Freedom Tower, 7 also sits atop an enormous concrete vault (it’s not there for blast resistance but because it houses a Con Edison substation that powers much of Lower Manhattan). But from the street, the concrete isn’t visible. Childs has covered the base with handsome stainless steel panels designed by the celebrated TriBeCa designer James Carpenter. Carpenter also designed the tower’s exterior glass cladding, which surrounds its office space from the eighth story to the top.”
This is a tribute to a building that isn’t about to be built, or one no one seems willing and able to occupy. Tower 7 is up and open. The designer chose glass that’s low in iron, according to Salon and is coated with an anti-reflective material that keeps out radiant heat. “The glass is so transparent that at certain hours, when the sun hangs low on the horizon, Tower 7’s walls seem to disappear, and you can see through entire floors of the building.”