The Statue of Liberty Before It Was Green

Posted by Benjamin Starr
From http://www.visualnews.com/

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Did it ever occur to you that the official greeter of New York, the Statue of Liberty, wasn’t always green? Constructed in Paris in the 1880′s, the statue was made with an exterior of untreated copper, which as many know from seeing old neglected pennies, slowly turns green over time through oxidation (not so the ones in your pocket as they are slowly polished through friction). The builders of the statue clearly knew that over time the lady would turn a dull green, but think of how it must have originally appeared as new immigrants arrived at Ellis Island, shining a warm welcome in the New York sun.

The image above, Photoshopped by Shaun Sanders over at Hipmunk, looks something like what the original would have.

Below: The statue under construction in Paris, France. It clearly shows a metallic, copper finish.

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Below: A diorama built by Frenchman Bartholdi in about 1880 depicts the statue under construction in its original color (probably a closer resemblance to the true copper hue).

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Below: Interestingly, the new de Young museum in San Francisco is slowly taking the same path towards a green future. The extremely modern building is sheathed in a copper facade which is already starting to show the signs of age. As planned, the museum will slowly blend in with it’s natural surroundings in Golden Gate Park.

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Below: the walls of the de Young are perforated and textured to replicate the impression made by light filtering through a tree canopy. Here we see the walls transitioning to a black color which will then change to green.

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Via: twentytwowords.com