Room 09 of 111 · GRAND CENTRAL TERMINAL · 1913

Under the stars

The concourse under a celestial vault, light falling through the great arched windows, the brass clock at the centre.

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Under the stars

Grand Central Terminal, the history

Grand Central Terminal opened on February 2, 1913. Reed and Stem and Warren and Wetmore designed it for the New York Central Railroad. The ceiling of the main concourse shows the zodiac, painted backward, after a sketch by Paul Helleu. In 1978 the Supreme Court upheld the terminal's landmark status in Penn Central v. New York City.

Source · Grand Central Terminal ↗

What the room is built from

The green celestial ceiling with gold constellations, the arched east and west windows, the opal faced clock on the information booth, marble everywhere. Mood: timeless. Everything is procedural geometry with painted surfaces; nothing is a scan or a photograph. The room is an interpretation, and it hangs the New Yorkers the census recorded at this place first.

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UNDERGROUND4 MIN
The Subway Opens, 1904
The IRT opened on October 27, 1904 with a nickel fare; how three systems became one in 1940 and how the map came to be.
THE TERMINAL4 MIN
Grand Central Terminal, 1913
Electrification, air rights, the painted sky on the concourse ceiling, and the 1978 Supreme Court case that kept Grand Central standing.
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