Who designed the Freedom Tower?

• A. David Childs and Daniel Libeskind
• B. Frank Gehry
• C. Renzo Piano
• D. Norman Foster

Answer: (A)

The design of the Freedom Tower rests on a collaboration between a visionary master plan and the engineer-architect who turned that vision into a real building. Daniel Libeskind conceived the World Trade Center site’s overall plan and symbolic massing, shaping the idea of the tower within the redevelopment. David Childs of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill then took that concept and developed the concrete, buildable tower design—refining form, structure, and the curtain-wall to meet engineering, safety, and program requirements. The final result reflects Libeskind’s guiding vision and Childs’s detailed execution, which is why both are credited. The other listed architects were not the designers of this tower.