Hector Guimard (1867-1942) was one of France’s greatest Art Nouveau architect/designers. In an exhibition organized by the Richard H. Driehaus Museum in Chicago and Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York, accompanied by a gorgeous catalogue, seven distinguishedscholars share their research and knowledge of Guimard. The book’s insightful essays
Anthony Alofsin— When you think about Frank Lloyd Wright, you think of him as the architect of the prairies and Chicago, but there’s another story—Wright and New York—that reveals a person and a life we’ve never known. Between 1925 and 1932 the city turned him around, moving him from personal
Why would anyone write a book about the architect Gordon Bunshaft? The consensus is that he was a rude and unpleasant man and, though he was responsible for the design of prominent buildings (Beinecke Library, for one), there’s a chorus of disdain in the background saying that as the chief
Nicholas Adams– At times, writing about the architect Gordon Bunshaft (1909–1990), former chief designer for the firm of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill (SOM), was like writing about a sulky teenager. Architects, of course, have lots of ways of talking. Philip Johnson was garrulous––people liked to say that he talked a
Architectural historian Anthony Alofsin offers us an entirely new way of looking at role New York City played in the life and career of Frank Lloyd Wright — and a new way of looking at the city, as well. YaleUniversity · Frank Lloyd Wright and New York City Subscribe: Apple
Martino Stierli– 2018 marks the 40th anniversary of the publication of Rem Koolhaas’s Delirious New York. The book, which has been in print continuously and is one of the best-selling architecture titles of the past 40 years, not only made its author instantly famous; it is also considered one of
On the last day of 2016, we lost one of the world’s foremost architectural historians when James Sloss Ackerman died at age 97. Ackerman was a consummate, and widely esteemed, academic, whose rigorous method set architecture in the broader contexts of cultural and intellectual history. He was a Fellow of
To mark the Queen’s birthday parade on June 11th, architectural historian Kathryn Morrison, author of Apethorpe: The Story of an English Country House, has written a marvelously entertaining guest post recounting a “royal progress” that saw kings and queens from James I through to George IV visiting this fascinating and architecturally significant