Spire spires were an astounding architectural innovation, beginning with the early fourteenth-century spire at Freiburg Minster, in which the pierced stonework was held together by iron cramps. The openwork spire, according to Robert Bork, represents a "radical but logical extension of the Gothic tendency towards skeletal structure." The organic skeleton of Antoni Gaudi's phenomenal spires at the Sagrada Família in Barcelona represent an outgrowth of this Gothic tendency. Designed and begun by Gaudi in 1884, they were not completed until the 20th century. In England, "spire" immediately brings to mind Salisbury Cathedral. Its 403-foot (123-m) spire, built between 1320 and 1380,
Chicago Spire the Trump International Hotel and Tower. Trump's tower completed construction in January 2009, just a few blocks west of the Chicago Spire site. If the Chicago Spire had been built as planned, it would have replaced the Trump International Hotel and Tower as the tallest residential structure in the United States, and the two towers would have been in direct competition in selling residential units. After several months of development in 2005, Carley failed to obtain sufficient financing for the construction of the building. Irish developer Garrett Kelleher, executive chairman of Shelbourne Development Group, Inc., acquired the land and took