Chicago School of

Architecture

LECTURER AR. PRADIP POKHAREL

11 JAN 2019
CHICAGO SCHOOL
CHICAGO SCHOOL
CHICAGO SCHOOL
CHICAGO SCHOOL
CHICAGO SCHOOL
CHICAGO SCHOOL
CHICAGO SCHOOL
 CHICAGO
• 3rd largest city in the United States - with a population of
nearly 3 million
• Incorporated in 1833 between the Great Lakes and the
Mississippi River
• Experienced rapid rebuilding and growth after the Great
Chicago Fire of 1871 destroyed almost a third of the city
• Increased land prices due to the increase in population and
scarcity of land
• So, 1st skyscraper constructed during rebuilding period in
1885 using steel-skeleton construction
• Many architects relocated to the city from New England for
construction of 1893 World Columbian Exposition
 CHICAGO
• Exposition drew around 2.75 million visitors –
considered among the most influential world fairs
in history
• Many architects including Burnham, Root, Adler
and Sullivan went on to design other well known
Chicago landmarks because of the Exposition
• Today, Chicago's skyline is among the world tallest
• Three tallest in the city are the Sears Tower (tallest
in U.S.), the Aon Center and the John Hancock
Center
• Chicago as one of largest cities and greatest
collections of tall commercial buildings,
"skyscraper"
 SKYSCRAPERS
• Very tall, continuously habitable building
• Coincidence of several technologies and social
developments
• Need for buildings that rise rather than spread due to
increasing population density in urban areas
• Installation of 1st safe passenger elevator (in Haughwout
Department Store, New York City) in 1857 made practical
buildings 4-5 storied tall
• Use of steel frame made possible construction of truly tall
buildings
• Structural definition based on steel skeleton as opposed to
constructions of load-bearing masonry, which passed their
practical limit in 1891 with Chicago's Monadnock Building
 SKYSCRAPERS
• 1st skyscraper was 10-storey Home Insurance Building in
Chicago, built in 1884–1885 Architect, Major William Le
Baron Jenney Led to "Chicago Skeleton" form of
construction
• Sullivan's Wainwright Building in St. Louis, 1890, was 1st
steel frame building, considered -1st true skyscraper
• Early skyscrapers emerged in Chicago, London, and New
York toward end of 19th century
• Chicago's skyline wasn’t allowed to grow until 1960; over
next 15 years many towers were built - 442-m (1,451-ft)
Sears Tower
• Today, however, many tall skyscrapers are built almost
entirely with reinforced concrete
SKYSCRAPERS
 The CHICAGO SCHOOL
• Chicago School - group of Modern American Architecture in
Chicago, Illinois at the turn of the 20th century (between
1883 to early 1990s)
• Also known as Commercial style
• Among 1st to promote new technology of steel-frame
construction in commercial buildings and developed spatial
aesthetic which influenced developments in European
Modernism
• Development started after Great Fire 1871 - Chicago was
boomtown
• By 1890 population of more than million and became 2nd
largest metropolis in United States
• Value of land soared - low buildings inefficient use of space
 The CHICAGO SCHOOL
• Innovative tall office building were perfected – key,
invention of elevator
• Chicago - special problem - stood upon swamp
• 1873, Frederick Baumann proposed each vertical element
of building - separate foundation ending in broad pad –
distribute weight over marshy ground
• Used in Montauk Block (1882) by Burnham & Root
• But Baumann's foundation occupied basement space and
could support only 10 stories
• Adler & Louis Sullivan developed better solution
• Adler devised vast raft of timbers, steel beams & iron I-
beams to float Auditorium Building (1889)
 The CHICAGO SCHOOL
• Early structures - load-bearing walls of brick and stone –
replaced by metal skeleton frame – architects perfected
skyscraper
• William Jenney constructed world's 1st first completely
iron-and-steel-framed building – Home Insurance Building
in 1884
• When Home Insurance Company asked Jenney to design
office tower, he designed iron skeleton to bear weight of
structure – but Carnegie-Phipps Steel Company supplied
steel instead of iron beams
• Advantages - almost fireproof; more interior rental space;
new floors be added easily; exterior walls no longer holding
building, could be replaced by glass – important in early era
of electrical lighting
 The CHICAGO SCHOOL
• Inspiration for Chicago style – 2 disparate sources
• 1st - Henry Hobson Richardson – Romanesque - Marshall
Field Wholesale Store of 1885 - round-arched building –
altered design of Adler & Sullivan's Auditorium Building
• Solon S. Beman’s brick and granite Pullman Building of
1883 and Fine Arts Building of 1885 – influence Burnham &
Root to embrace Romanesque for Art Institute and
Rookery, 1888
• Sullivan - interior of Auditorium Theater and entrance to
Chicago Stock Exchange of 1894 brought Chicago
Romanesque to most complete and impressive
development
 The CHICAGO SCHOOL
• 2nd - nature of material adopted – steel - led in two
directions
• 1 – sinuous curve –examples - light court of Rookery and
stairways and elevator grills in Adler & Sullivan's Chicago
Stock Exchange
• 2 – aesthetic implication of iron and steel - daringly
expressed in Holabird and Roche's 13-story office tower,
Tacoma Building of 1889 – 1st building constructed using
rivets
 ELEMENTS OF CHICAGO SCHOOL
• First to promote new technologies of steel-frame
construction in commercial buildings

This had two prerequisites

1. Elevator, invented by Elisha Graves Otis in1853, which
would at once allow travel to great height, optimizes space
and be fire proof

2. Use of Steel skeleton (by William Le Baron Jenney), in

contrast to the cast iron type, proved not only reliable under
stress but also under strain and formed a completely rigid
structural system clad with masonry to make it more heat-
resistant
 ELEMENTS OF CHICAGO SCHOOL

• Use of limited
amounts of exterior
ornament
• Sometimes elements
of Neoclassical
Architecture are
used in Chicago
School skyscrapers
 ELEMENTS OF CHICAGO SCHOOL
• Many Chicago School skyscrapers contain the three parts of
a classical column
• 1st floor as base, middle stories (usually with little
ornamental detail) as shaft & last floor as capital (with
ornamental detail capped with cornice)

capital

shaft

base
 ELEMENTS OF CHICAGO SCHOOL

• Use of steel-frame buildings

with masonry cladding
(usually terra cotta), allowing
large plate-glass window areas
ELEMENTS OF CHICAGO SCHOOL
• "Chicago window”
• 3-part window consisting of large fixed
center panel flanked by two smaller
double-hung sash windows
• Arrangement of windows on facade
typically creates a grid pattern, with
some projecting out from facade
forming bay windows
• Combined need for light-gathering and
natural ventilation; a single central
pane was usually fixed, while 2
surrounding panes were openable
 ARCHITECTS
• William W. Boyington (1818-1898)
• William Le Baron Jenney (1832-1907)
• Henry Hobson Richardson (1838-1886)
• Dankmar Adler (1844-1900)
• Daniel Hudson Burnham (1846-1912)
• John Wellborn Root (1850-1891)
• Solon S. Beman (1853-1914)
• William Holabird (1854-1923)
• Martin Roche (1855-1927)
• Louis Sullivan (1856-1924)
• Irving Kane Pond (1857-1939)
• Allen B. Pond (1858-1929)
 ARCHITECTS
• George Maher (1864-1926)
• Richard Ernest Schmidt (1865-1958)
• Edgar D. Martin (1871-1951)
• Mackie Gorden Garden (1873-1961)
• Walter Burley Griffin (1876-1937)
• Frank Lloyd Wright started in firm of Adler and Sullivan but
created his own Prairie Style of Architecture
• Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who had run Bauhaus in
Germany before coming to Chicago, is sometimes credited
with rise of second "Chicago school" between 1939 and
1975
 WILLIAM LE BARON JENNEY
(1832-1907)
• Innovative construction methods earned
the title, “Father of the Skyscraper”
• Constructed world's 1st completely iron-
and-steel-framed building in 1880s - Home
Insurance Company Building
• 1853 - enrolled in Paris's École Centrale des
Arts et Manufactures (Classmate - Gustave
Eiffel)
• Served as engineer in union army during
American Civil War(1861-65)
• After war, settled in Chicago - practiced and taught
architecture at University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (1876-80)
• In 1868 established office - training ground for number of
leading architects - Martin Roche, William Holabird, and
Louis Sullivan
Works
• Leiter Building I (1879, enlarged 1888, later demolished)
• Home Insurance Company Building (1884-85, enlarged
1891, demolished 1931)
• Manhattan Building(1889-90)
• The Leiter Building II (1889-90)
• Ludington Building (1891)
• The Fair Store (1891-1892)
 LEITER BUILDING I

• Constructed
1879, enlarged
1888, later
demolished
• Expression of
the framed
structure
 HOME INSURANCE BUILDING
• Built 1884-85, Enlarged 1891,
• Demolished 1931
• Location: Chicago, Illinois, USA
• Stories: 10, Height: 138 ft (42 m)
• Structure: Steel frame
• Facing Material: Brick
• 1st building entirely supported by light exposed steel frame
– considered the 1st skyscraper
• Steel frame liberated exterior walls from supporting
building, walls instead thin curtain wall
• Weighed only 1/3 as much as a stone building
• Fire proof well lit office building
HOME INSURANCE BUILDING
 THE LEITER BUILDING II
• Built: 1889-1890
• Location: 403 south state st., Chicago
• Stories: 8
• Structure: Cast Iron frame

• Also known as Sears Building

• One of most important buildings in history of American
Architecture
• 1st commercial building to have metal skeletal frame
• Cast iron skeletal frame used to make the design fireproof
THE LEITER BUILDING II
 LUDINGTON BUILDING
• Built: 1891
• Location: 1104 S. Wabash Ave, South Loop, Chicago
• Stories: 8
• Structure: Steel frame
• Construction that changed modern architecture
• One of 1st structures completely clad in terra cotta
• Its purity of form and delicacy of ornamental detail mark
as significant visual landmarks
• Designated Chicago Landmark on June 10, 1996
LUDINGTON BUILDING
 DANIEL HUDSON BURNHAM
(1846-1912)
• Raised and educated in Chicago, gained early
architectural experience with William le Baron Jenney
• In 1873 formed partnership with John Wellborn Root
(1852-1891) – Burnham & Root
• Works
• The Montauk Building (1881-2)
• The Rookery Building
(1885-88; lobby remodeled 1905-07)
• The Monadnock Building (1889-91)
• The Reliance Building (1890-95)
• The Heyworth Building (1904)
 THE ROOKERY BUILDING
• Built: 1885-88
• Location: 209 S. LaSalle St.
• Stories: 12, Height: 181 ft (55 m)
• Structure: Skeletal frame
• Red marble, terra cotta and brick facade – embraced
Romanesque
• Marked transition from masonry load-bearing structures to
steel skeleton load-bearing structures
• Has unique style of exterior load-bearing walls & interior
steel frame
• Lobby remodeled in 1907 by Frank Lloyd Wright
• Again restored to original Wright design starting in 1989
THE ROOKERY BUILDING
 THE MONADNOCK BUILDING
• Built/Founded: 1889-1891
• Stories: 17 Height: 197 ft (60 m)
• Last load bearing skyscraper
• North end rose to 16 stories, using load bearing masonry
walls (from 6 ft in thickness at base to 1 ft at top)
• Southern addition made by use of modern steel framing for
entire load bearing structure, allowing reduction in wall
thickness and increase in interior leasable space on lower
floors of building
• Employing cast and wrought iron framing only for window
spandrels and internal frame
• Tiers of canted bay-windows, huge crowned coved cornice
THE MONADNOCK BUILDING
 THE RELIANCE BUILDING
• Built: 1890-1895
• Location: 20 North State Street, Chicago Illinois.
• Stories: 14
• Structure: Steel Frame
• 1st skyscraper to have large plate glass windows - make up
majority of its surface area
• Extremely narrow piers, mullions, & spandrels, covered
with cream-colored terra cotta decorated with Gothic-style
tracery
• 1st 4 floors erected in 1890, addition of 10 more in 1894–
1895
• Steel-frame superstructure built atop concrete caissons
sunk as much as 125 ft beneath footing
THE RELIANCE BUILDING
 LOUIS SULLIVAN, HENRY
(1856-1924)
• Regarded as spiritual father of modern US Architecture and
identified with early skyscraper design
• Came to Chicago in 1873, where he worked briefly for
William Le Baron Jenney
• In 1879, joined firm of Dank man Adler (1844-1900)
• “Form follows function”
Works
• Auditorium Building (completed in 1889, restored 1967)
• Wainwright Building (1883-1885)
• Guaranty building (1894-5)
• Schlesinger & Mayer Department
LOUIS SULLIVAN, HENRY
(1856-1924)
 AUDITORIUM BUILDING
• Built: 1889, Restored 1967
• Stories: 10 (17 storey tower)
• Structure: Load Bearing Masonry Wall
• Exterior partly based on H.H. Richardson's Marshall Field
Warehouse
• Most innovative features was massive raft foundation
• Exterior features - 2-storey, roughhewn granite base
topped by floor of rusticated limestone & above, a smooth-
faced limestone that created flat wall plane from 4th floor
to tower
• 4,300 seat auditorium, 136 offices and 400-room hotel
AUDITORIUM BUILDING
 SCHLESINGER & MAYER DEPARTMENT
• Built:1899
• Location: 1 South State Street
• Also known as Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company Building
• Classic structures of Chicago school
• Corner entry to be seen from both State and Madison
• Remarkable for steel structure, which allowed increase in
window area - more daylight and larger displays of
merchandise to outside pedestrian traffic
• Chicago Window
SCHLESINGER & MAYER DEPARTMENT
 HOLABIRD AND ROCHE
• Founded in 1881 by William Holabird (1854-1923) and
Martin Roche (1855-1927), who met while working in the
architectural office of William Le Baron Jenney
• Influential in development of early skyscraper - “Chicago
School”
Works
• Tacoma Building (1889,demolished 1929)
• The Old Colony Building (1894)
• The Marquette Building (1894-5)
• City Hall-County Building (1905-08)
• The Chicago Building
• The LaSalle Hotel
• The Hilton Hotel
 THE TACOMA BUILDING
Built:1889
Demolished 1929
Storey:12
• Structure of cast-iron columns and wrought-iron beams as
well as brickwork and concrete and steel
• Whole clad in terracotta and glass
 THE OLD COLONY BUILDING
• Built: 1894
• Located: 407 S. Dearborn St.
• Rounded corner bays, a feature of
many early skyscrapers, enliven
the silhouette of this commercial
structure.
• Continuous vertical piers divide
the building's long Dearborn
Street facade into tall, narrow
sections, while continuous
horizontal spandrels serve to
visually widen the narrow Van
Buren Street facade
 THE MARQUETTE BUILDING
• Built : 1894-1895
• Located: 140 S. Dearborn St.
• Structure: Steel frame
• Stories: 17
• Rises 16 stories, covered with brown brick & terra cotta
• In 1950 decorative cornice was removed to add a 17th
floor
• Facade clearly reveals its underlying structure - with broad
windows set in framework of narrow piers and spandrels
• Open and well-lit interior layout, built around a central light
court, significantly influenced design of modern high-rise
commercial structures
THE MARQUETTE BUILDING
 CONCLUSION
• Chicago - "birthplace" of modern tall building
• Realizing value of land - vertical structure rather than wider
ones - Development of elevator
• Development of frame structure using light material (steel)
with high strength
• Use of initially iron, then steel framing allowed for birth of
curtain wall buildings
• Construction mostly "post fire“ - fire protective methods
used around steel framing
• Floor systems normally made of clay tiles within steel/iron
framework, although some earlier buildings used flat brick
vaults to make floors