The term "skyscraper" came from sailor slang, meaning the tallest mast
of a ship, and thus the new tall buildings that rose close to the mast
forests of Downtown Manhattan in the late 19th century were dubbed
The growing densities, made possible by the high-rise building, made
the real-estate prices soar up, which dictated even higher building to
get the most of the purchased land. The formal grid layout of Manhattan
(introduced in 1811 not only because it allowed greater efficiency and
economy for developing and expanding the city, but also because the
buildings would be thus easier to locate and identify in legal
documents), the space restriction and, in the beginning, an almost
total lack of building regulations added to the incentive to build
Until the mid-1910s, the skyscrapers in NYC, such as the
Park Row Building and
Flatiron Building, were generally
characterized by their influence from past architectural styles and
their straightforward massing, which was dictated by developers' will
to utilize the valuable plots to the maximum.
Consequently, the set-back form of the skyscrapers dating from the
1920s and prevalent well into the 1950s (like in the "stepped pyramid"
of the 120 Wall Street) was, in turn, a
method of "countering" the effects of the
1916 zoning regulations.
At the same time, also the style of the NYC high-rise changed along the
themes of Art Deco to one of overall simplicity, yet extensive detail.
The age of the set-back Art Deco skyscraper was best epitomized by such
landmarks as the Chrysler Building,
Empire State Building, and Rockefeller
Center, which combined the ideology of new architectural "language"
with extensive decor -- and sheer size.