Chrysler Building
in pixels

About Chrysler Building

The Chrysler Building stands at 405 Lexington Avenue, on the corner of 42nd Street in Midtown Manhattan. The project began with the developer William H. Reynolds; in October 1928 the car maker Walter P. Chrysler took it over, paying more than $2.5 million for the site, lease, plans and the services of the architect William Van Alen. Construction started on 21 January 1929, and the building opened on 27 May 1930.

It was built in the middle of a race for the sky. Its rival, 40 Wall Street, reached 927 feet in 1929, just above the Chrysler Building’s announced height. Van Alen had a spire assembled in secret inside the crown, and on 23 October 1929 it was hoisted into place, taking the building to 1,046 feet (319 metres). It was the tallest building in the world until the Empire State Building opened on 1 May 1931.

The building is a masterpiece of Art Deco, and much of its ornament nods to cars. At the 31st floor a frieze of stylised hubcaps and fenders runs round the setback, with replicas of the 1929 Chrysler radiator cap on the corners. Steel eagle heads project from the corners of the 61st floor. Above them the crown rises in seven terraced arches of Nirosta stainless steel, pierced by triangular windows and topped by the needle.

Inside, the lobby is clad in marble under Edward Trumbull’s ceiling mural Transport and Human Endeavor. The crown was always meant to glow; lighting in its triangular windows was finally installed in 1981. The building became a National Historic Landmark in 1976, and New York City designated its facade and lobby as landmarks in 1978.

The diorama

The diorama puts the Chrysler Building on a floating island of Midtown, built in Three.js and rendered as pixel art: the scene is drawn at a low resolution, every edge gets a dark outline, the colours are reduced to a small palette, and the result is scaled up without smoothing. The tower rises from a black granite ground floor with tall triangular entrances, steps back in brick setbacks to a band of steel hubcaps with winged radiator caps on the corners, then runs up as a white shaft with notched corners to the eagles of the 61st floor, the seven tiers of steel arches with their triangular windows, and the needle.

At its foot, Lexington Avenue and 42nd Street cross under traffic lights, and yellow cabs, cars and a bus stop and go with the signals. Steam rises from an orange-and-white Con Ed stack and a manhole, a hot-dog cart with a blue and yellow umbrella stands by a slice of Grand Central’s facade, and wooden water tanks sit on the neighbouring roofs. At night the arches of the crown light up in white chevrons, the windows of Midtown glow and the street lamps come on.

Things to spot

• The steel eagles jutting from the corners of the 61st floor
• The hubcap frieze and winged radiator caps lower down
• Cabs queuing at the red light on 42nd Street
• Steam drifting from the Con Ed stack
• The hot-dog cart with its blue and yellow umbrella
• The crown’s white chevrons switching on at night

What we simplified

• The lot is drawn square: in reality it is longer on Lexington Avenue than on 42nd Street, and the setbacks of the base are more intricate.
• Grand Central is pulled right up to Lexington Avenue and reduced to a slice of its 42nd Street facade; the neighbouring towers are generic Midtown blocks.
• The crown, eagles and radiator caps are drawn bolder than real so they read at pixel size, and the crown has fewer triangular windows than the real one.

Isometric maps of New York

New York also has 3 isometric pixel-art maps made by the community: the whole city drawn tile by tile in the same SimCity-like style. See the maps of New York →