Passage excerpt:
When the Paris Métro opened in 1900, the transit company sought to make the new underground railway inviting rather than intimidating. They commissioned architect Hector Guimard, whose modular cast-iron entryways came to define the city's aesthetic. Guimard’s designs utilized organic forms—such as arches resembling orchid stalks and glass canopies shaped like butterfly wings—to ease the public's transition from the familiar streets into the dark, subterranean platforms. By blending these natural motifs with structural metal, he created spaces that felt open and organic.
The writer wants to replace the bolded sentence with one that highlights how the physical architecture of the entrances specifically countered the public's fear of descending into a dark, subterranean space. Which choice best accomplishes this goal?
- These greenhouse-like structures bathed the stairwells in natural light, making the descent feel like entering a sunlit garden conservatory rather than descending into a tomb.Answer
- BThe iron frames, which were painted green to resemble oxidized bronze, were cast in local foundries and assembled on-site to minimize street-level disruption.
- CThese glass-and-iron structures transformed the stations, they made the new underground transit network feel like a modern exhibition.
- DCommuters, who feared the dark platforms, appreciated the glass canopies, that let in natural light.