New York State Pavilion
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The New York State Pavilion is a historic world's fair pavilion at
Flushing Meadows–Corona Park Flushing Meadows–Corona Park, often referred to as Flushing Meadows Park, or simply Flushing Meadows, is a public park in the northern part of Queens, New York City. It is bounded by I-678 (Van Wyck Expressway) on the east, Grand Central Par ...
in Flushing,
Queens Queens is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Queens County, in the U.S. state of New York. Located on Long Island, it is the largest New York City borough by area. It is bordered by the borough of Brooklyn at the western tip of Long ...
,
New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...
. It was designed in 1962 for the
1964 New York World's Fair The 1964–1965 New York World's Fair was a world's fair that held over 140 pavilions and 110 restaurants, representing 80 nations (hosted by 37), 24 US states, and over 45 corporations with the goal and the final result of building exhibits or ...
by architects Philip Johnson and Richard Foster, with structural engineer
Lev Zetlin Lev Zetlin (July 14, 1918 – December 4, 1992) was an Israeli-American civil and structural engineer. Founder of the engineering consulting firm Lev Zetlin & Associates, he developed several innovations in structural engineering including the d ...
.


Architecture

The pavilion consists of three components of
reinforced concrete Reinforced concrete (RC), also called reinforced cement concrete (RCC) and ferroconcrete, is a composite material in which concrete's relatively low tensile strength and ductility are compensated for by the inclusion of reinforcement having hig ...
and steel construction: the "Tent of Tomorrow", Observation Towers, and "Theaterama". ''Note:'' This includes an
''Accompanying 23 photographs''
/ref> The Tent of Tomorrow is elliptical in plan, and its sixteen 100-foot reinforced concrete piers once supported the largest cable suspension roof in the world. The main floor of the Tent was a large scale design of a
Texaco Texaco, Inc. ("The Texas Company") is an American Petroleum, oil brand owned and operated by Chevron Corporation. Its flagship product is its Gasoline, fuel "Texaco with Techron". It also owned the Havoline motor oil brand. Texaco was an Indepe ...
highway map of New York State, made of
terrazzo Terrazzo is a composite material, poured in place or precast, which is used for floor and wall treatments. It consists of chips of marble, quartz, granite, glass, or other suitable material, poured with a cementitious binder (for chemical bindi ...
. An idea floated after the fair to use the floor for the
World Trade Center World Trade Centers are sites recognized by the World Trade Centers Association. World Trade Center may refer to: Buildings * List of World Trade Centers * World Trade Center (2001–present), a building complex that includes five skyscrapers, a ...
did not materialize. The Observation Towers are three concrete towers, with the tallest at high. The towers have observation platforms which were once accessed by two (now-removed) "Sky Streak capsule" elevators attached to the tallest (western) tower. The southern tower has a platform height of and the northern tower is at . Theaterama was originally a single drum-shaped volume of reinforced concrete. Additions to the original structure were made from 1992 to 1993 and from 2008 to 2009. The Theaterama is home to the
Queens Theatre The Sondheim Theatre (formerly the Queen's Theatre) is a West End theatre located in Shaftesbury Avenue on the corner of Wardour Street in the City of Westminster, London. It opened as the Queen's Theatre on 8 October 1907, as a twin to the n ...
, a performing arts center which produces and presents theatre and dance, as well as children's and cultural programming.


After the fair

The New York State Pavilion was one of two pavilions retained for future use; the other one was the United States Pavilion building. No reuse was ever found for the US Pavilion however, and it became severely deteriorated and vandalized; it was ultimately demolished in 1977. The New York State Pavilion was used for TV and movie sets, such as an episode of '' McCloud''; for '' The Wiz''; part of the setting (and the plot) for ''
Men in Black In popular culture and UFO conspiracy theories, men in black (MIB) are purported men dressed in black suits who claim to be quasi-government agents, who harass, threaten, or sometimes even assassinate unidentified flying object (UFO) witnesses t ...
''; and the centerpiece for the Stark Expo in '' Iron Man 2''. It was also the venue for rock concerts, as part of the Singer Bowl Festival in 1969, which included
Led Zeppelin Led Zeppelin were an English rock band formed in London in 1968. The group comprised vocalist Robert Plant, guitarist Jimmy Page, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham. With a heavy, guitar-driven sound, they are ci ...
, the
Grateful Dead The Grateful Dead was an American rock music, rock band formed in 1965 in Palo Alto, California. The band is known for its eclectic style, which fused elements of rock, Folk music, folk, country music, country, jazz, bluegrass music, bluegrass, ...
,
James Brown James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 – December 25, 2006) was an American singer, dancer, musician, record producer and bandleader. The central progenitor of funk music and a major figure of 20th century music, he is often referred to by the honor ...
,
Joe Cocker John Robert "Joe" Cocker (20 May 1944 – 22 December 2014) was an English singer known for his gritty, bluesy voice and dynamic stage performances that featured expressive body movements. Most of his best known singles were recordings of son ...
,
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and other headline groups of the era (see for poster ads). It was also the filming location in 1987 for the video clip for the debut single by
They Might Be Giants They Might Be Giants (often abbreviated as TMBG) is an American alternative rock band formed in 1982 by John Flansburgh and John Linnell. During TMBG's early years, Flansburgh and Linnell frequently performed as a duo, often accompanied by a d ...
,
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. In the decades after the fair closed, it was an abandoned and badly neglected relic, with its roof gone and the once bright floors and walls almost faded away. Once the red ceiling tiles were removed from the pavilion in the late 1970s, for safety reasons, the terrazzo floor was subject to the elements and was ruined. In 1994, the Queens Theatre took over the Circarama adjacent to the towers, and continues to operate there, using the ruined state pavilion as a storage depot. For the 50th anniversary of the World's Fair, on the morning of April 22, 2014, the long-shuttered New York State Pavilion was opened to the public for three hours. Because of the pavilion's state of decay, visitors were required to wear
hardhat A hard hat is a type of helmet predominantly used in workplace environments such as industrial or construction sites to protect the head from injury due to falling objects, impact with other objects, debris, rain, and electric shock. Suspensi ...
s. The event was hosted by the New York State Pavilion Paint Project and NYC Parks. A larger than expected crowd turned out, upwards of five thousand people, to get the rare glimpse inside the Tent of Tomorrow. That same day, the
National Trust for Historic Preservation The National Trust for Historic Preservation is a privately funded, nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., that works in the field of historic preservation in the United States. The member-supported organization was founded in 1949 by ...
also named the Pavilion as one of its National Treasures.


Restoration plans

Some conservation and restoration efforts were demonstrated in 2008 by researchers from the
University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...
, and a handful of local groups are advocating to raise funds to complete the restoration of the terrazzo floor. The pavilion was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
in 2009. In late 2013, the
New York City Department of Parks and Recreation The New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, also called the Parks Department or NYC Parks, is the department of the government of New York City responsible for maintaining the city's parks system, preserving and maintaining the ecolog ...
announced plans to restore the pavilion with new landscaped paths and event spaces at an estimated cost of $73 million, as opposed to the $14 million cost to demolish the structure. Renewed interest was shown in the pavilion's restoration in early 2014, the 50th anniversary of its opening. In July 2014, the pavilion received about $5.8 million for restoration. The
New York Mets The New York Mets are an American professional baseball team based in the New York City borough of Queens. The Mets compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member of the National League (NL) East division. They are one of two major league ...
also donated some money for the preservation effort. However, the pavilion was damaged the same month by arsonists. In May 2015, the New York Structural Steel Painting Contractors Association, in conjunction with the New York City Parks Department and members of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades (District Council 9, Local 806), announced a project to repaint the rusty steel framework of the Tent of Tomorrow. After testing paint chips, the color "American Cheese Yellow" was selected as the best match for the original color. The majority of the labor was done by union trainees, and materials were supplied by the contractors, constituting a $3 million donation. All work was completed by August 2015. Two proposed designs for the New York State Pavilion's restoration won New York City's 2018 Annual Awards for Excellence in Design. , the New York City government planned to award contracts for the pavilion's restoration, set to be worth $14.25 million, in May 2019. The restoration was planned to take up to one and a half years. Work on the project started in November 2019, and the restoration was expected to be completed in early 2021.


In media

The 1997 film ''
Men In Black In popular culture and UFO conspiracy theories, men in black (MIB) are purported men dressed in black suits who claim to be quasi-government agents, who harass, threaten, or sometimes even assassinate unidentified flying object (UFO) witnesses t ...
'' presents the circular observation decks as being disguised
flying saucers A flying saucer (also referred to as "a flying disc") is a descriptive term for a type of flying craft having a disc or saucer-shaped body, commonly used generically to refer to an anomalous flying object. The term was coined in 1947 but has g ...
. In the film, the 1964 World's Fair is said to have been a cover to allow extraterrestrials to land on Earth. The exterior of Men in Black: Alien Attack, a ride at Universal Studios Florida, features a replica of the two tallest observation decks. The Pavilion is the subject of a documentary film titled ''Modern Ruin: A World's Fair Pavilion'' produced by filmmaker and teacher Matthew Silva. The documentary premiered on May 22, 2015, in the Queens Theatre which was formerly the theaterama, the third component of the New York State Pavilion. In March 2016, People For the Pavilion and the
National Trust for Historic Preservation The National Trust for Historic Preservation is a privately funded, nonprofit organization based in Washington, D.C., that works in the field of historic preservation in the United States. The member-supported organization was founded in 1949 by ...
launched an international ideas competition to allow the public to reimagine possibilities for what the pavilion could become. The site was featured in the 2008 video game '' Grand Theft Auto IV'' and its episodes. It also appears in '' Skate 3'' as part of the Maloof Money Cup 2010 NYC DLC pack, with a concrete skatepark inside the structure.


See also

*
List of towers Several extant building fulfill the engineering definition of a tower: "a tall human structure, always taller than it is wide, for public or regular operational access by humans, but not for living in or office work, and are ''self-supporting' ...
*
Space Needle The Space Needle is an observation tower in Seattle, Washington, United States. Considered to be an icon of the city, it has been designated a Seattle landmark. Located in the Lower Queen Anne neighborhood, it was built in the Seattle Center f ...


References


External links

*
New York World's Fair 1964 1965 - New York State Pavilion

New York State Pavilion ProjectPeople for the Pavilion
{{DEFAULTSORT:New York State Pavilion Buildings and structures completed in 1964 Buildings and structures in Queens, New York Buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in New York City Flushing Meadows–Corona Park Historic American Engineering Record in New York City National Register of Historic Places in Queens, New York World's fair architecture in New York City New York (state) maps 1964 New York World's Fair