Hugh Ferriss

Hugh Ferriss ( born July 12, 1889 in St. Louis, Missouri, † January 28, 1962 in Greenwich Village, New York City ) was an American architect and architectural artist who has become known primarily for his dramatic perspective representations of high-rise buildings.

Ferriss studied in his hometown of St. Louis, Missouri architecture ( at Washington University ). However, it is not a building known to its actual planning he had participated leader. Ferriss ' significance lay rather in the graphic presentation of the projects of other architects for the general public or to investors, he worked as a so-called " Delineator ". As such, he was employed in 1912 in the company of well-known New York architect Cass Gilbert, 1915 Made with consent Gilbert's own, and reached the peak of his fame in the 1920s. His drawings appeared at that time in popular magazines such as Harper 's Magazine, and Vanity Fair. Among other Ferriss illustrated the structural possibilities of mathematically combined Abtreppungsvorschrift the famous building code of the city of New York from 1916. 1929, at the climax and turning point of the American post-war economy, his book " The Metropolis of Tomorrow ". It shows gigantic skyscrapers of New York's type in the characteristic of Ferriss representation with dramatizing light and shadow effects, including some monumental buildings in the form of suspension bridges over straits. Due to the onset of the stock market crash of October 1929, the world economic crisis Ferriss ' book was, as well as the fate of the planned before the onset of the Great Depression ( and despite these unrealized ) Empire State Building emblematic for the overheated [ construction ] fantasies before the big crash.