NEW YORK (Reuters) - Another venerated architect has entered the field of luminaries presenting designs for the site of the World Trade Center -- but this one has been dead for 77 years.

Spain's Antoni Gaudi conceived a futuristic hotel for Manhattan in 1908, a soaring tower nearly as tall as the Empire State Building and coincidentally intended for what became the location of the twin towers.

A group of artists from the Barcelona visionary's native Catalonia and a Boston architect named Paul Laffoley plan to enter Gaudi's design in the formal Lower Manhattan Development Corp (LMDC) memorial competition for the site, to begin this spring.

"It's one of those moments in architecture where it's gone a little bit haywire," said Barbara Littenberg, whose Manhattan firm has one of the nine site designs in the contest.