Renzo Piano to design New York Times building

Architect Renzo Piano

NEW YORK (AP) -- The New York Times has picked a noted Italian architect to design its new 40-story headquarters in the Times Square area.

Renzo Piano, who has designed buildings in Chicago, Paris, Berlin and elsewhere, was selected largely on the strength of his distinctive proposal for the building's design, the newspaper reported Friday.

Piano won the prestigious Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1998. One of his best-known buildings is the modernistic Georges Pompidou Center in Paris, a museum famous for its whimsical, factorylike appearance with multicolored pipes outlining the facade.

The Times' building will be the first in New York designed by him.

Although designs have not been finalized, Piano's proposal would drape the glass facade of the building in an envelope of screens that would appear to be floating around the tower.

The new offices will be on Eighth Avenue between 40th and 41st streets, across the street from the Port Authority Bus Terminal. If built, it would be the paper's seventh home.

The New York Times Co., from which Times Square took its name, has had its headquarters on West 43rd Street since 1913.

Construction is scheduled to begin in 2001. The Times has said the building will be occupied by 2004.

Copyright 2000 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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