The Chrysler Building is an iconic Art Deco skyscraper in New York City, located on the east side of Manhattan at the intersection of 42nd Street and Lexington Avenue. Standing 1,047 feet high, it was briefly the world's tallest building in 1930, before it was overtaken by the Empire State Building in 1931. Since the destruction of the World Trade Center in 2001, it is currently the second tallest building in New York.
Featuring automobile-related designs around its facade, the Chrysler Building was built in homage to the success of the auto giant for which it is named. The gleaming, Art Deco masterpiece on New York City's East Side, with its stainless chromium-nickel steel arches and narrow triangular windows, was a constant optimistic reminder of the possibilities inherent in the capitalist system. Although the Chrysler Building soon fell to the number-two spot on the New York skyline, the spirit and excesses of the period are forever frozen in its shiny surfaces, statement-making spire, and remarkably bold design.