Empire State Building

The Empire State Building also features in many films, but the film that made it even more famous then it already was, was the classic King Kong in 1933. Even today, though the building has been stripped from its title of the world's tallest building, it is a symbol of New York itself visited by
2 million people each year.At the time when it was built in the early 1930s on Fifth Avenue, the Empire State Building broke all records and was dubbed 'the 8th world wonder'.
The building had 64 elevators (now 73) and was constructed in only 1 year and 45 days. The skyscraper towered over the neighborhood with its height of 381 meter (1250 ft). As the Empire State Building was one of the last skyscrapers built before the Great Depression hit the real estate market, it wouldn't be topped until 1972, when the twinWorld Trade Towers dethroned the Empire State Building as the world's tallest building.The Empire State Building is built on a full city block. Much of it was occupied by the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, which opened in November 1897 as the city's largest hotel with 1050 rooms. It was one the most prestigious in New York and attracted an upper-class clientele. At the end of the 1920s however,
The Empire State Building was one of the last skyscrapers completed in New York before the Great Depression hit the real estate market. Demolition of the existing building at the site started just weeks before the stock market crash of 1929. After 1933 - with the construction of Rockefeller Center - no tall skyscraper would be built in the city for almost two decades.

As a consequence the Empire State Building held its title of the world's tallest 

The spire at night

building for more than 40 years. But the Great Depression also caused a collapse in the demand for office space. The owners had such a difficult time leasing office space that the building became known as the 'Empty State Building'. It would take until the end of the 1940s before the real estate market was fully recovered and in the early 1950s the Empire State Building even became the most profitable building in New York City.

the grand and plush design of the hotel had gone out of style and Waldorf-Astoria decided to build a new, larger hotel uptown.

After the site was cleared, construction started March 17, 1930. Thanks to an efficient design and standardized work - similar to an assembly line - the building would rise at an average of about four and a half floors a week, faster than any other skyscraper at the time. The building was officially inaugurated on May 1, 1931 in the presence of governor Franklin D. Roosevelt.