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Outrage emerges as Dutch firm is accused of using World Trade Center as inspiration for “The Cloud”

The-Cloud-MVRDV
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Last week, we brought you images of ” The Cloud” a luxury highrise planned for development in the Yongsan Dreamhub of Seoul, South Korea. It appears now that Rotterdam-based, Dutch architectural firm, MVRDV has found itself in hot water as their latest project  has drawn massive outrage. Sections within the media have led a storm of public outcry and criticized “The Cloud” for resembling New York City’s Twin Towers that tragically came down on September 11th, 2001.

In response to the resemblance of the Twin Towers, MVRDV has issued a public apology stating, “The Cloud was designed based on parameters such as sunlight, outside spaces, living quality for inhabitants and the city…It was not our intention to create an image resembling the attacks nor did we see the resemblance during the design process. We sincerely apologize to anyone whose feelings we have hurt, the design was not meant to provoke this”. According to MVRDV, the firm has received a number of “threatening calls and emails of angry people calling us Al Qaeda lovers or worse”.

Regardless of whether the design was intentional or not, it seems that plenty of people are upset with MVRDV; we would like to know what you think. Do you feel the “The Cloud” too closely resembles New York‘s Twin Towers? Let us know in the comments section below. 

Amir Iliaifar
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Associate Automotive Section Editor for Digital Trends, Amir Iliaifar covers the ever increasing cross-section between tech…
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