Woolworth Building

The Woolworth Building, completed in 1913, was the tallest building in the world for almost two decades — Cass Gilbert's neo-Gothic "Cathedral of Commerce," its terra-cotta tower crowned with pinnacles and tracery borrowed straight from medieval churches and built with five-and-dime money, paid for in cash.

Photographed May 2013, exactly a century after it opened. An ornate iron streetlamp anchors the corner as the tower blazes against a darkened sky. In black and white the Gothic crown reads like carved bone — the building that proved a skyscraper could be beautiful.