Quote:
Originally Posted by BillM
We should ask ourselves, what is it that started our interest in skyscrapers in the first place?
Was it just the buildings themselves with no particular context?
Or was it that skyscrapers were beacons that symbolize special places that have many other exciting features?
To me, it is the latter.
I think if I was just growing up today, I wouldn't have the same interest in skyscrapers. Now, there are non-descript skyscrapers popping up in suburbs or other boring places.
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Yes, that's definitely part of it. When I was growing up, if a city had a lot of skyscrapers it meant the city was both large and economically successful. Not every large, economically successful city had skyscrapers since there were some such places that lacked them. But these were mostly historic European cities and cities designed in that style such as DC. But it applied to every city that did have skyscrapers. Today, while this is still mostly true the perception has been eroded a bit. There just seems to be more exceptions now. There are many tall residential skyscrapers that aren't especially premium, and tall office and hotel buildings in the cities of poorer countries, sometimes built in part by governments. And while the total world population has grown, it seems like the ratio of tall buildings to people has grown faster.
Another important aspect is that in the late 19th and early-mid 20th century (well before my time), North America was the sole builder of such buildings. So there was a sort of self pride and perhaps some underlying feelings of superiority and exceptionalism attached to it. That sense of uniqueness started to get eroded when places like Australia and HK joined the club in the latter part of the 20th century, and it was eroded even further when the global flood gates opened in the 21st century. While one might take pride in being a member of a large club, there tends to be much more pride in belonging to a very small and exclusive club. So even if skyscrapers were still solely the domain of economically successful cities, it's not a very exclusive club any more and it's not a part of any unique self identity. Especially since NA hasn't had the tallest buildings for awhile.