A 2026 gift guide for the skyscraper lover

In 1929, William Van Alen and H. Craig Severance were each putting up a skyscraper in Manhattan, and each wanted it to be the tallest in the world. They had been partners until their firm broke up acrimoniously in the mid-1920s, with lawsuits over clients and assets that lasted more than a year. Van Alen announced 925 feet for the Chrysler Building, and that April, Severance raised his bank tower at 40 Wall Street to 927.

What Severance didn't know was that Van Alen had a steel spire delivered in four sections and assembled in secret inside the Chrysler Building's frame. On October 23, 1929, the day before the Wall Street crash began, the crew raised it through the top of the dome and riveted it into place in about 90 minutes, which took the building to 1,046 feet. It was the tallest building in the world until the Empire State Building, which added five floors and a spire of its own after its developer saw the Chrysler's, passed it on May 1, 1931.

This list is things a skyscraper fan might enjoy as much as that story, for ages from about 5 to 50. It has two building kits, a remote control crane, four books, an original drawing and four ways to get up close to skyscrapers in New York and Chicago. Listed prices run from $45 for a Woolworth Building lobby tour to $139.99 for the LEGO New York set. The metal model kit and the books cost less, the crane, City Climb and Top of the Rock tickets aren't priced here, and an original Hugh Ferriss drawing is for someday. Pick the items you want with "Add to wishlist," or take the whole list with the button at the bottom:

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Kits and a crane

LEGO's newest New York set came out in June 2026. It's 1,465 pieces and six landmarks built in white, including the Empire State Building and One World Trade Center, set against a black backdrop shaped like an apple, with yellow taxis and Central Park. It's rated 18 and up.

Metal Earth kits come as a single sheet of laser-etched stainless steel. You snip the parts out and bend tabs into slots, with no glue, and the Chicago Architecture Center sells this one in its shop.

The Dickie Toys crane is a tower crane 150 centimeters tall, just under five feet. The remote turns it a full 360 degrees and moves the trolley in and out along the jib, and it comes with a wrecking ball, a bucket and a load basket. It's rated for ages 3 and up and charges over USB.

Books

Philippe Petit strung a wire between the roofs of the Twin Towers and, at dawn on August 7, 1974, walked, danced and lay down on it for almost an hour. Police arrested him when he came off, and the judge sentenced him to perform for children in a city park. Mordicai Gerstein's picture book about the walk won the 2004 Caldecott Medal.

David Macaulay's Unbuilding starts with the Empire State Building being bought by an eccentric prince who wants to move it to the Arabian Desert, and then draws the building being taken apart. It came out in 1980, after his books on how cathedrals and castles were built.

Higher is Neal Bascomb's book on the race between the Chrysler Building and 40 Wall Street, told through Van Alen, Severance and the men who built the two towers.

Hugh Ferriss was the architectural illustrator New York architects hired to draw their buildings in charcoal before they were built. The Metropolis of Tomorrow came out in late 1929, just after the crash, with about 60 of his drawings: first real buildings, then the setback towers New York's zoning laws were pushing architects toward, then an imaginary city of widely spaced towers, many over 1,000 feet. The critic Justin Davidson wrote that it "shaped the dreams of architects, planners, comic-book illustrators, and Hollywood set designers."

An original Ferriss

Ferriss originals still come up at auction and through art dealers. In 2007, the Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Virginia, paid $15,000 at an Ohio estate auction for a period print of his Chrysler Building rendering, signed by Walter Chrysler, Van Alen and others on the project. Where the original rendering ended up isn't known.

Going up

The photo Lunch Atop a Skyscraper was taken on September 20, 1932, on the 69th floor of what's now 30 Rockefeller Plaza, about 850 feet up. The 11 ironworkers on the beam were real, but the shot was staged as publicity for the building, and nobody is sure who took it. Since December 2023, Top of the Rock has had a beam of its own that lifts riders 12 feet above the observation deck and turns them 180 degrees while a camera takes the photo. Kids between 42 and 52 inches tall can ride with an adult.

City Climb is on the outside of 30 Hudson Yards. Climbers in harnesses go up a 45-degree staircase on the side of the building to more than 1,200 feet, then lean out over the edge. Climbers have to be between 4.9 and 6.7 feet tall.

The Woolworth Building is 792 feet tall and was the tallest building in the world from 1913 to 1929. On April 24, 1913, President Woodrow Wilson pushed a button in Washington to turn on its lights. The lobby has a mosaic ceiling and carved caricatures of the people who built it: the architect Cass Gilbert holding a model of the building, the engineer Gunvald Aus measuring a girder and Frank Woolworth holding nickels and dimes. The building has no public access, so a guided tour is the only way to see the lobby, and the tours came back in 2026 after six years.

Chicago's Home Insurance Building, finished in 1885, is often called the first skyscraper because a steel frame held up its outside walls. It weighed a third as much as a masonry building, which worried the city enough that it stopped construction to investigate. It was torn down in 1931. The Chicago Architecture Center's river cruise is 90 minutes on the Chicago River, with a volunteer docent covering more than 50 buildings, including Willis Tower and the Wrigley Building.

In conclusion

The list above copies straight into a new WishPoster list with the Skyline theme, which has a tower crane lifting a steel beam over an art deco skyline. Or start one from scratch.