Daniel Libeskind, a New York City architect who descended to the depths of Ground Zero after Sept. 11, 2001, visited Pittsburgh’s Ground Zero on Thursday and Friday.
The son of Holocaust survivors, Mr. Libeskind will preserve and redesign parts of the Tree of Life / Or L’Simcha synagogue, the site of America’s worst antisemitic attack.
To Mr. Libeskind, chosen as the master planner for the post-9/11 World Trade Center site, tragedy is an intimate companion. Here, he saw the Squirrel Hill synagogue’s garden, main sanctuary, chapel, education center, social hall and small parking lot.
As he visited the synagogue’s complex, he listened for “inaudible voices. It’s not something easy to absorb. There is a human sound that cries out to you,” the architect said during an interview Friday in Squirrel Hill. The synagogue occupies about an acre-and-a-half of land at Shady and Wilkins avenues.