Inventing the Skyline—The Architecture of Cass Gilbert

Designed by the architect of the Broadway Chambers Building, the U.S. Custom House, the Minnesota State Capitol, the St. Louis Art Museum, and large-scale projects like the city plan for New Haven, Connecticut, Cass Gilbert's pioneering skyscrapers - "symbols of our national genius and unrestraint" - profoundly influenced architects during the first decades of the twentieth century and epitomize the Beaux Arts "City Beautiful" aesthetic he embraced throughout his career. Containing essays by major Gilbert scholars, this illustrated volume considers the full breadth of Gilbert's career. The book also documents details about the buildings: the color scheme of the main entrance of the Minnesota State Capitol, made to resemble the Byzantine tomb of Galla Placidia in Ravenna; the controversy that erupted over the use of female nudes on the relief of the Essex Country Courthouse; and the ill-fated plans for the George Washington Bridge as a Beaux Arts monument with elaborate plazas, fountains, and sculptures.

Margaret Heilbrun is the library director of the New York Historical Society.