Media Capital

Book excerpt: Nineteenth-century press barons in New York City helped to invent the skyscraper. Early newspaper buildings in the country's media capital were designed to communicate both commercial and civic ideals, provide public space and prescribe discourse, and speak to class and mass in equal measure. Wallace illustrates how the media have continued to use the city as a space in which to inscribe and assert their power. She considers how architecture contributed to the power of the press, the nature of the reading public, the commercialization of media, and corporate branding in the media industry.