08-15-2012
King in the Queen City
Every now and then I arrange a weekend trip to visit important buildings in the US. When asked by some friends to organize one such trip, I chose Buffalo, as it offers not one, but several dozen interesting sites. (It's also home to one of the most amazing collections of Abstract Expressionist art in the world at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery.) The city takes you back almost a hundred years to a time before the Great Depression, when American industry was really growing, and Buffalo was its Queen on the Lake.
Today, you wouldn't think that Buffalo has much to offer, but in its day it was a progressive, industrial city, shaping the economic landscape of the United States with new ways of doing business. It is a city of firsts and a storehouse of significant commercial architecture. Many of the great American architects from the turn of the century through the post-war period are represented with signature buildings that went on to influence the face and practice of the field. Louis Sullivan's Guaranty Building is a defining work positing that the design of a building should be organic and shaped by its use – "form ever follows function." Louise Blanchard Bethune's masterpiece, the Hotel Lafayette, represents - in its massive scale - the indomitable will of the first professional female architect in America, the first female member of the AIA, and the first woman bestowed the title of Fellow. Daniel Burnham's "office block," the Ellicott Square Building, was the largest office building of its time and housed the first dedicated motion picture theater, Vitascope Hall. H.H. Richardson, Calvert Vaux, Frederick Law Olmstead, Eero and Eliel Saarinen, Gordon Bunshaft, and many others produced some of their most significant work here.
Another architect who left an indelible mark on the field with two projects in Buffalo was Frank Lloyd Wright. His Larkin Building (1904-1906) was ahead of its time and only recently in the age of Google and sophisticated workplace design, are his ideas understood as true innovations. In the Larkin Building Wright created a work environment of heightened interactivity and engagement between administration, staff, and information. Unfortunately, the building was demolished in 1950, and all that remains is a small brick pillar. Faring better is his Martin House Complex (1903-1905), an example of Wright's Prairie Style practice on par with the Robie House in Chicago. Still in the process of a major restoration, the complex is a collection of five buildings - three of which have been completely rebuilt. Adjacent to the complex is a visitor's center designed by Toshiko Mori; a tall, light, minimal glass box with a design strategy that runs counter to Wright's low, inward-turning set of bunkers.
The Larkin Building and the Martin House Complex were Wright's first commission outside of Chicago. He was a young architect, and these buildings marked an important step in the development of his career. Darwin D. Martin, his client for both projects, was a prominent businessman who helped transform the Larkin Soap Company into one of the biggest companies in America at the time. Wright worked counter to contemporary styles so as to focus on essential elements of architecture -- space, view, light, and circulation through space. When moving through the Martin House Complex, one feels the weight of the interior architecture, and is either compressed or pushed forward into different horizons. His rooms are places for passive activities -- reading, talking, studying, looking out onto a view. There are few spaces in any of the buildings in which one can imagine a dance party or a large holiday dinner.
The buildings that make up the Martin House Complex, like many of Wright's residences, have the feel of places made for American Transcendentalists like Emerson or Thoreau. They are bulwarks for the spirit set in a natural world, unknown but full of potential. They are studies where individuals can become agents and makers of their own lives.
I would like to thank Mary Roberts, Executive Director of the Martin House Complex, for taking three hours out of her day to show me every square inch of the place, and for sharing this oft-overlooked gem of a project by one of the kings of American Architecture.
by Angelo Monaco
Today, you wouldn't think that Buffalo has much to offer, but in its day it was a progressive, industrial city, shaping the economic landscape of the United States with new ways of doing business. It is a city of firsts and a storehouse of significant commercial architecture. Many of the great American architects from the turn of the century through the post-war period are represented with signature buildings that went on to influence the face and practice of the field. Louis Sullivan's Guaranty Building is a defining work positing that the design of a building should be organic and shaped by its use – "form ever follows function." Louise Blanchard Bethune's masterpiece, the Hotel Lafayette, represents - in its massive scale - the indomitable will of the first professional female architect in America, the first female member of the AIA, and the first woman bestowed the title of Fellow. Daniel Burnham's "office block," the Ellicott Square Building, was the largest office building of its time and housed the first dedicated motion picture theater, Vitascope Hall. H.H. Richardson, Calvert Vaux, Frederick Law Olmstead, Eero and Eliel Saarinen, Gordon Bunshaft, and many others produced some of their most significant work here.
Another architect who left an indelible mark on the field with two projects in Buffalo was Frank Lloyd Wright. His Larkin Building (1904-1906) was ahead of its time and only recently in the age of Google and sophisticated workplace design, are his ideas understood as true innovations. In the Larkin Building Wright created a work environment of heightened interactivity and engagement between administration, staff, and information. Unfortunately, the building was demolished in 1950, and all that remains is a small brick pillar. Faring better is his Martin House Complex (1903-1905), an example of Wright's Prairie Style practice on par with the Robie House in Chicago. Still in the process of a major restoration, the complex is a collection of five buildings - three of which have been completely rebuilt. Adjacent to the complex is a visitor's center designed by Toshiko Mori; a tall, light, minimal glass box with a design strategy that runs counter to Wright's low, inward-turning set of bunkers.
The Larkin Building and the Martin House Complex were Wright's first commission outside of Chicago. He was a young architect, and these buildings marked an important step in the development of his career. Darwin D. Martin, his client for both projects, was a prominent businessman who helped transform the Larkin Soap Company into one of the biggest companies in America at the time. Wright worked counter to contemporary styles so as to focus on essential elements of architecture -- space, view, light, and circulation through space. When moving through the Martin House Complex, one feels the weight of the interior architecture, and is either compressed or pushed forward into different horizons. His rooms are places for passive activities -- reading, talking, studying, looking out onto a view. There are few spaces in any of the buildings in which one can imagine a dance party or a large holiday dinner.
The buildings that make up the Martin House Complex, like many of Wright's residences, have the feel of places made for American Transcendentalists like Emerson or Thoreau. They are bulwarks for the spirit set in a natural world, unknown but full of potential. They are studies where individuals can become agents and makers of their own lives.
I would like to thank Mary Roberts, Executive Director of the Martin House Complex, for taking three hours out of her day to show me every square inch of the place, and for sharing this oft-overlooked gem of a project by one of the kings of American Architecture.
by Angelo Monaco