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The Life and Death of The World’s Tallest Building

Lost Masterpieces

It was once the tallest building of the world—but in the late 1960s it was rendered suddenly obsolete, and so New York lost the Singer Building.

William O’Connor

Travel Editor

Updated Oct. 20, 2019 2:18PM ET / Published Apr. 30, 2016 12:01AM ET 
BEAST INSIDE

Alamy; Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast

One of the great ironies of the 20th century is that for all the drama surrounding each grand new building, they all age about as well as that meme about Russian women.

There is perhaps no building more representative of this fate than the once iconic and now non-existent Singer Building.

In fact, when it was destroyed in 1968 (the tallest building ever destroyed until the Twin Towers) The New York Times obituary headline blared: “Daring in ’08, Obscure in ’68.”

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