The Empire State Building

 The Empire State Building is an Skyscraper situated at the intersection of the 5th Av. an West 34th Street, in New York. Its name derives from the State of New York and was the tallest building of the world (443 meters) for more than 40 years, from 1931 to 1972 when the north tower of the World Trade Center was completed. It was the first building with more than 100 floors and weighs about 370.000 tones.

The building was named as one of the seven wonders of the modern world by the America Society of Civil Engineers and it and its inside (with a three-floor hall) were named as monuments by the Comission for the Preservation of Historics Monumnets of New York. At 1986 was named as national monument and, since 2007 occupies the number one of the american fovourite buildings.

 

The hall

The Empire State was designed by William F. Lamb with an Art Decó style and the planes were drawn in only two weeks using previous planes. Tha main constructors were the Starrett and Eken brothers. Tha excavations started at january 22, 1930 and the construction at march 17. The building opened its doors at may, 1931 by an special way: The president Herbert Hoover turned on the light from Washington DC. converting the Empire State to the building of the lights. The constructions costs $40.948.900.

 The construction

The open coincided with the Great Depression and that's why a part of its space was not occupied. This fact derived to a many jokes naming it as Empty State Building.

At the beginning, the design includes a mooring mast and a tank for zeppelins and the floor 102 was a landing platform. A lift between the floor 86 and 102 would transport the passengers.
However, the idea was declined because it was useless and dangerous and, at 1953, a broadcast tower was added at the top of the needle.

 Floor 86

It has an office area of 200.500m2, an observatory in the floor 86 and its own zip code. With, aproximately, 21.000 employers, is the second office complex of America behind the Pentagon.

Thinking about the future, during the design, the team thought about the new needs, that's clear if we take a look into the oversized electric system.

At 1964 there were added the lights to illuminate the top of the Empire State by different colors.

 Top lights

After an energetic improvement and with $550 million of invest, the Empire State got, in september 2011, the LEED Gold certification for sustainable buildings.