Larry himself seems to have lost his touch on this tower as well, it’s every time a different story or rumor about something in the pipeline, next year etc, etc.
Build it on spec, go for the diamond shape design that was meant to work with / compliment the complex and it’s memorial pools. Just not some re-redesign heavily influenced by the climate mania by extensive additiion of greenery and holes. The diamond shaped design can be “climate friendly” as well.
Holy f dog. The diamond design is not happening. And hasn’t been for a decade. It’s not going to happen and tenants don’t want it too.
Can we just be happy the design is nice at least? It could be a lot worse, as shown with BIG’s design
The NY Post article features a pretty high-resolution version of the previously leaked rendering, sourced from VisualHouse – great to see all the details!
I believe the green terraces and holes are less about climate-friendliness, and more about providing more outdoor amenities for tenants. The wider variety of floorplate shapes, compared to the original design’s podium and tower, may also be a benefit, as that feature was touted by Ingels for his design.
Unpopular opinion but BIG’s design worked much better than most give it credit for. I read once that Ingels’ first choice would have been to rebuild the original twins, and after that I started noticing how his design seemed to appear as a sibling to 1 WTC from several angles, recapturing the twin effect better than any of the other designs. I thought it also completed the spiral nicely, though I think Foster’s new version does a better job of that.
The diamond design is iconic, but it detracts from the overall effect of building up toward 1 WTC. The designs that have followed feel more respectful of this.
I decided to upscale the high-resolution image of 2WTC with my AI to try and get as much detail as possible. Was worth it.
If they were going to go for a setback after setback design they should have gone with BIG’s. It is much more cohesive with 1, 3 & 4 WTC. This new Foster design just doesn’t fit with the rest of the complex in my eyes. It’s a beautiful design but it feels to standoutish among the rest.
The upscaled image won’t work for me.
And whoever took the image of the rendering shot, along with lining up the perspective of 2 WTC with the vicinity, should give it a retry. This rendering was probably thrown together to get a rough look on that iteration of the tower. Which makes me believe a slightly different design coukd be the outcome.
But seriously when I first saw that rendering, I was confused about the placement…now I know why
It’s definitely a rough cut, most likely for internal presentations at Silverstein Properties – just look at 4WTC!
Still, the NY Post must have gotten this from an official source as it’s the first time it’s been released as such high resolution, so maybe this is just the stage the design is currently at.
I believe the common site photo, along with the renderings, point the middle of the frame to 30 Park Place. The original image for the rendering seems to be pointed more towards 7 WTC, then the perspective was shifted on the edit. Thats why 4 World Trade looks like that, when you shift a wide angle you get exaggerated angles like that
I more meant the way that 4WTC is spliced together from several different photographs, with very clunky seams on the western facade – you are right that it’s probably the result of needing to extend the base photograph’s FOV rightwards. It reminds me of the preliminary 270 Park rendering by ATChain which also had quite clunky seams where the background photography had been spliced.
Ah yes, I see that now. The photoshop is not strong with this one
Thanks to both of you for your sleuthing 
Two more Memorial Pool view renderings, with a more accurate model thanks to feedback from @TKDV:
As long as we don’t have any sign of this resuming it might as well get another redesign to answer to market that changes every couple of months. Might as well be 2031 before we see something rise when every office worker -must have- 50% yoga space or whatever trend will change the needs by than.
What tenants? The whole problem with 2WTC is that none are yet interested. I haven’t heard of any prospective tenants saying “gosh, we’d love to move in, but could you lose the diamonds?”.
Exactly my point.
So the tenants who don’t exist don’t want the building to be built a certain way? If there’s evidence that prospective tenants specifically don’t like Foster’s original design, I’d really like to see who they are and what they’d prefer.
I think one thing that the diamonds specifically have against their favour is that it makes the office levels above around 1050’ difficult for tenants to occupy and furnish, with the floorplates becoming smaller and smaller triangles. Both BIG and the latest Foster design have larger, rectangular floors all the way up to roof level, offering more practical floorplates at the most attractive heights.
Of course the later designs also offer outdoor terraces and a wider range of floorplate sizes, but those features don’t necessarily preclude retaining the diamond crown.
