Dale Allen Gyure

Lawrence Technological University, Southfield, Michigan, United States of America
dgyure@ltu.edu

Two Views of the World Trade Center, or The Doubles of Minoru Yamasaki

Minoru Yamasaki’s World Trade Center, tragically destroyed in 2001, was the defining commission of his life and a unique experiment with doubled form. Today architectural doubles are rather common, but in the 1960s they were rare. Yamasaki’s use of the doubled form has traditionally been explained as a pragmatic response to the client’s requirement of 10 million square feet of office space on a restricted site in New York. However, its distinctiveness indicates that perhaps other factors were involved in their creation. This essay will attempt to understand the World Trade Center from two angles: as both an architectural and a psychological double. Architecturally, the Twin Towers popularised a new skyscraper typology, although the project was attacked in the architectural press. Psychologically, the World Trade Center’s doubled form may have been influenced by events in Yamasaki’s life, particularly his status as a Nisei. The double has a long history in art, literature, and mythology of symbolizing death or narcissism, or as a manifestation of psychological fracture. The essay argues that the doubled Twin Towers might be viewed as both an homage to Mies van der Rohe and a revelation of a divided self. In these days when images of violence and destruction dominate the news, some of the more architecturally minded among us recall the tragedy of the World Trade Center’s destruction almost a quarter-century ago. The World Trade Center is best known for its disastrous end rather than as an outstanding work of architecture and engineering. The Twin Towers were a cultural phenomenon before 9/11, both loved and hated, but certainly unique. They were the creation of Minoru Yamasaki, one of the most famous American architects of the 1960s. Their double nature reflected several of influences, from Yamasaki’s admiration of Mies van der Rohe to the desire to reduce the mass of a ten-million square foot building. Additionally, the Twin Towers may also reveal some insights into Yamasaki’s psychology.
What were the origins of this complicated and controversial project? Why did it utilise the double? This essay will attempt an archaeology of the Twin Towers by taking two views—one architectural, one personal—that promise to enhance our understanding of this landmark project.

Keywords: skyscraper; psychology; modernism; Yamasaki; Mies.