The new financial trading floor of the Chicago Board of Trade is a striking sight, and Caitlin Zaloom describes it well. Opened in 1997, it occupies a 'huge stone block'; the trading floor itself is 'the size of Grand Central Station', and has no windows or even a public entrance. The walls are 'unadorned granite, shiny, cold and imposing', with huge electronic displays of prices, index levels and interest rates running across the top. 'Diffuse, bright, fluorescent light comes from the fixtures four stories above . . . There are no internal walls to break up the space.'

LRB 1 November 2007 | PDF Download