Cleveland Skyline

When Terminal Tower opened in 1930 it was the tallest building in the world outside New York City, and it held that distinction until 1964. For a city that is now more often discussed in terms of decline, that is worth stating plainly: Cleveland built one of the defining skyscrapers of the age, and it still stands at the centre of the skyline.

Its shape is pre-war in a way nothing else in the cluster is — a stepped stone shaft rising to a tiered, pinnacled crown. Against the flat-topped glass towers that came later, that profile is unmistakable, and it is the first thing a Cleveland model has to get right.

Key Tower went up in 1991, reached 947 feet, and took the title of tallest in Ohio. It stands close enough to Terminal Tower that the two read as a pair, and the contrast between them — 1930 stone against 1991 granite and glass, pinnacle against stepped pyramid — is the most characteristic thing about the Cleveland silhouette.

Model the pair accurately and the city identifies itself. Flatten either one and it becomes a skyline that could belong to half a dozen Midwestern cities. We print both at their true relative heights rather than compressing the gap, which is the compromise that quietly ruins most city models.

Key Tower leads at 947 feet, a granite and glass shaft stepping to a pyramidal crown, still the tallest building in Ohio. Terminal Tower stands immediately beside it — 1930, stone, tiered, pinnacled — and the pairing of the two is the whole composition.

200 Public Square, the old BP building, is the dark stepped tower to the east, and the Justice Center's plain slab sits north of them. Lake Erie closes the top edge. For a model this size the main job is keeping the 61-year gap between Terminal Tower and Key Tower legible rather than letting them read as contemporaries.