St. Louis Needs A New Monument

The striking St. Louis Arch is an icon of the city's past, and sends the wrong symbolic message. Is it time for a new monument?

1 minute read

July 12, 2001, 1:00 PM PDT

By Chris Steins @planetizen

"While the Arch is the most striking visual feature of the St. Louis skyline, its stark lines and flashy steel skin are, at this juncture, something of a cliché. There's the symbolic allusion to St. Louis's role as "gateway" to the west and the word "architecture" stems from the word "arch." So there's architecture and history wrapped up in that brash, gleaming rascal and St. Louis is noted for a wealth of both. But do we as a city wish to project the image of a mere stopping point in a progressive journey to other places? ... A new monument should be considered, one more flattering and assertive in its depiction of St. Louis."

Thanks to Design Architecture

FULL STORY: St. Louis: its own arch enemy

Wednesday, July 11, 2001 in St. Louis Post-Dispatch

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