The 32nd President of the United States, Franklin D Roosevelt, set out four goals in his famous 1941 State of the Union address: freedom of speech and expression; freedom of worship; freedom from want; freedom from fear. The Four Freedoms Park - a spatial celebration of and memorial for what is commonly known as Roosevelt's Four Freedoms speech - is finally about to open, almost 40 years after it was originally conceived.
Designed by American architect Louis Kahn in 1973, the space sits on the southern tip of Roosevelt Island in the East River of New York City. Due to Kahn's death in 1974, and the lack of political and financial backing at the time, its plans were shelved for some 30 years and it wasn't till 2010 that construction work began.
The Four Freedoms Park - a strikingly geometrical, triangular space - revolves around a focal point near its very tip; the 1,050-pound bronze bust of President Roosevelt created by artist Jo Davidson.
It also includes a square granite area that Kahn called the 'Room' - an open-air plaza looking towards the water and the United Nations building across the river. True to the architect's vision, the stone used was the same one that Kahn specified in 1973 (granite from North Carolina's Mont Airy).
The beautifully landscaped park also features five Copper Beech trees, which mark its entrance, as well as 120 Little Leaf Linden trees elsewhere within the grounds.
This is the only Louis Kahn project in New York City and the last in the architect's remarkable career that spanned about 50 years and included key work such as the Yale University Art Gallery and the Salk Institute in California.
The Four Freedoms Park is set to become a key city landmark, a highlight in the fields of architecture and education alike. It also offers a brand new 12.5-acre waterfront public space with spectacular views of the Manhattan skyline.
The park sits on the southern tip of Roosevelt Island in the East River of New York City
The Four Freedoms Park is a spatial celebration of and memorial for what is commonly known as the Four Freedoms speech...
... which the 32nd President of the United States Franklin D Roosevelt delivered in his famous 1941 State of the Union address. Courtesy Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum
The park is finally about to open, almost 40 years after it was originally conceived
It was designed by American architect Louis Kahn in 1973. Pictured here, is one of Kahn's sketches of the park. Courtesy: Louis I. Kahn Collection, University of Pennsylvania and the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The focal point of the strikingly geometrical, triangular park is at its very tip...
... where visitors will find the 1,050-pound bronze bust of President Roosevelt created by artist Jo Davidson.
It also includes a square granite area that Kahn called the 'Room' - an open-air plaza looking towards the water and the United Nations building across the river
True to the architect's vision, the stone used was the same one that Kahn specified in 1973 (granite from North Carolina's Mont Airy)
The beautifully landscaped park also features five Copper Beech trees, which mark its entrance, as well as 120 Little Leaf Linden trees elsewhere within the grounds.
The park offers a brand new 12.5-acre waterfront public space with spectacular views of the Manhattan skyline.
An inscription from Roosevelt's Four Freedoms speech.
-
Seven kitchens, one fire: inside LA’s hottest new food marketAt Maydan Market, chef Rose Previte turns global street food and layered design into a vibrant, fire-lit experience
-
Zegna’s exclusive new perfume is legacy in a bottleIl Conte, of which only 300 (refillable) bottles exist, evokes the early 20th-century office of company founder Ermenegildo Zegna, still preserved in an Alpine mansion
-
A new American airline hopes to bridge the worlds of private aviation and business classMagnifica Air’s Airbuses have acres of space, private suites and white-glove treatment for your precious luggage, coming soon to a route near you
-
The most important works of modernist landscape architecture in the USModernist landscapes quite literally grew alongside the modern architecture movement. Field specialist and advocate Charles A. Birnbaum takes us on a tour of some of the finest examples
-
Jeanne Gang’s single malt whisky decanter offers a balance ‘between utility and beauty’The architect’s whisky decanter, 'Artistry in Oak', brings a sculptural dimension to Gordon & MacPhail's single malt
-
This perfectly cubed house sits atop a hill in Hudson ValleyForma’s ‘House on a Hill’ resembled a black wooden box – all straight lines and sharp angles against the rolling backdrop of New York State
-
An idyllic slice of midcentury design, the 1954 Norton House has gone on the marketNorton House in Pasadena, carefully crafted around its sloping site by Buff, Straub & Hensman, embodies the Californian ideal of the suburban modern house embedded within a private landscape
-
Herzog & de Meuron and Piet Oudolf unveil Calder Gardens in PhiladelphiaThe new cultural landmark presents Alexander Calder’s work in dialogue with nature and architecture, alongside the release of Jacques Herzog’s 'Sketches & Notes'. Ellie Stathaki interviews Herzog about the project.
-
Meet Studio Zewde, the Harlem practice that's creating landscapes 'rooted in cultural narratives, ecology and memory'Ahead of a string of prestigious project openings, we check in with firm founder Sara Zewde
-
The best of California desert architecture, from midcentury gems to mirrored dwellingsWhile architecture has long employed strategies to cool buildings in arid environments, California desert architecture developed its own distinct identity –giving rise, notably, to a wave of iconic midcentury designs
-
A restored Eichler home is a peerless piece of West Coast midcentury modernismWe explore an Eichler home, and Californian developer Joseph Eichler’s legacy of design, as a fine example of his progressive house-building programme hits the market
