Railroad Remnants

Knee deep in one of my Google Maps adventures (it’s a black hole), I came across a weird angled street that doesn’t exist.

YOU: A street that doesn’t exist? You mean, like, an alley? Or the L?

ME: Ehh not really, kinda. It’s N Lakewood Ave, so it’s a street. But, then suddenly at Belmont Ave, the street ends, but the buildings make it seem like it keeps going. Let me explain.

It’s show-and-tell in class today, so I brought visual aids.

Image courtesy of Google Maps

Do you see what I’m saying? That weird, angled void of building traveling southwest to northeast, basically running into the bottom of Wrigley Field. I guess it sort of looks like a street at this scale. Not doing myself any favors. Let’s zoom in.

Courtesy of Google Maps

Courtesy of Google Maps

Courtesy of Google Maps

Hopefully this helps. So, after seeing this and being confused, I decide to investigate on foot. It isn’t much of a trek, since I live very close by. Nonetheless, I threw on the trench coat and grabbed the magnifying glass. At street level, it looks like some developer or architect just wanted to put a funky angle on some of the building(s). But, I know that I saw a greater pattern when looking at the bird’s eye view. There’s more to this story. As I walk south, a set of old railroad tracks emerges in the middle of the street! Ah-ha! A break through. Just call me Sherlock. With more information at hand, I go back to my place to dive deeper.

Courtesy of University of Alabama and Chicago in Maps

Courtesy of University of Alabama and Chicago in Maps

It turns out that N Lakewood Ave is an old railroad track. (Should I have said spoiler alert earlier? Oh well). I found an old Rand McNally map of the Chicago Railroads from both 1901 and 1921. (Look at the North-South railroad line that has the “Belmont” station).

This isn’t some great revelation of history. I didn’t find the catacombs of Chicago, nor did I find the true source of the Great Chicago Fire. But, this is a small example of how design legacy is shown in our urban fabric. Our actions - our designs - can and will impact the future. The folks who laid out the network of railroads inevitably had an impact on where and how current Chicagoans live. In this instance, history allowed us (maybe forced us) to break the grid - creating an exciting and fun twist in Chicago’s latticework.

The Eyes of the Skin

Architects really struggle to write. They use pedantic, superfluous linguistics to examine the circuitous principles of the abstract, but also relatively concrete, schemas of architectural codification. Have you started banging your head on a wall yet? See what I did there? For older generations, this way of writing is not their fault. It was the style of time, but nonetheless, it’s frustrating and confusing to read. For contemporaries, well, I don’t know what to say. Architects need to release their hold on academic language. Look, I’m guilty of falling into this trap at times, but we all have to work on improving. Anyway, I was reminded of this while I was reading The Eyes of the Skin: Architecture of the Senses, which Juhani Pallasma first published in 1996.

The Incredulity of Saint Thomas by Caraveggio, which appears on the cover of the book

Image Courtesy of Wikipedia

Pallasma argues that architecture has been diluted to merely the visual image. As a culture, we are so obsessed with things ‘looking good’ that we have pushed away all other senses. I wholeheartedly agree. The idea is a simple and legitimate point to digest. The book, however, was like choking down a fiber bar. You know it’s good for you, but it ‘s a bit of a struggle. Okay, I’m being dramatic. But he doesn’t make it easy. I wasn’t an English major, but I remember my 7th grade teacher constantly saying “show, don’t tell.” Pallasma tells a lot.

I don’t want to bad mouth Pallasma any more because, like I said, he’s got some very valid arguments. We need to embrace all of our senses (even beyond the classical 5)! And, I get it. Architects search for a way to communicate beyond their buildings. Writing is one of the easiest ways to get those ideas across. Yeah, you could draw. You could paint. You could create a sculpture. Or, you could even build something. But how do you distribute those mediums? When you’re communicating, you want to be able to easily connect to your audience. Writing gives you that platform. And, thanks to technology, it’s now even easier now to connect and share with. That’s literally why I write this blog. But, you also have to engage the audience. Keep them interested!

Speaking of, one interesting quote is “The door handle is the handshake of the building,” (56). I’ve definitely heard this quote before, but it was great to see the context behind it. Before reading this book, I saw that quote as an excuse to design a whacky door handle for no reason. Maybe I’m just a shallow designer, but now I get it. Pallasma is emphasizing the importance of details and the power of tactility and materiality.

My favorite quote from the book is: “The real measure of the qualities of a city is whether one can imagine falling in love in it,” (70). What can I say…I’m a romantic, and I love cities. Here, Pallasma is talking about the influence of the urban environment. He’s not talking about the beauty of buildings themselves but about the beauty that the buildings can create. What a powerful notion. And, felt from the rest of the book, he would argue that the beauty, any beauty, comes from a combination of all the senses, not just a pretty picture.

A third quote to snack on is: “Understanding architectural scale implies the unconscious measuring of the object or the building with one’s body, and of projecting one’s body scheme into the space in question,” (67). To be honest, I don’t really feel like dissecting this right now, but it’s important and thought provoking.

I have to say that I’m biased. I get really frustrated with all academic writing, not just architecture. It’s pretentious and inaccessible. The author seems to be actively attempting to alienate themselves from their own audience. This book reminded me of that. But, luckily I love architecture, so I was able to barrel through it. (And it’s a short book!) I just want architecture and the conversations around architecture to be for everyone. Everyone should be able to love, appreciate, and learn about architecture because it has the power to change lives. Like I said, I’m a romantic.

Burglar's Guide to the City

Do you ever look at a wall and say: that could be a door if I just throw my entire body through it? Yeah, I don’t either. But that’s because we’re not burglars! Retelling stories of thieves, shadowing law enforcement, training for a zombie apocalypse, and thinking through the ‘defensive’ built environment, Burglar’s Guide to the City by Geoff Manaugh (the man behind BLDGBLOG) provides a new way to look at architecture and urbanism. The book’s scope starts big. We look at cities and their infrastructure, and then we zoom into buildings. Eventually, we asses the tools that both assist and fight burglars.

Image Courtesy of burglarsguide.com

I’m biased because I have an obsession with Los Angeles, but one of the more fascinating parts of this book is the light that it sheds on LA and its crime scene. Manaugh joins in a helicopter patrol flight, surveying the vast landscape, noting the noodled network of highways and the countless dead-end cul-de-sacs. LA is urban sprawl. It’s a huge group of smaller neighborhoods that are well connected. Racing in a getaway car, burglars use that to their advantage.

The location of a building greatly impacts its vulnerability. If you’re a burglar, looking to rob a convenience store or break into a house, you want a quick means of getting away. You look for a place that is close to a highway on ramp. But even in a denser, more urban city like Chicago or New York, you search for a potential target that is close to a public transit stop. Rob the place, hop on the subway, blend into the crowd, and never be seen again. Yet, it’s counterintuitive. As a prospective homebuyer, you want access to these transportation stops. But your desire to be connected runs parallel with a burglar’s desire to be able to get away.

On a more positive note, Jason Bourne (my favorite movie character) gets a shoutout. Manaugh mentions Matt Jones’ essay explaining why Jason Bourne is the “ultimate urbanist.” Manaugh notes: “Bourne’s superpower is simply that he uses cities better than you and I,” (258). I think that Jason Bourne is better than me at everything, not just using cities, but hey maybe that’s just me.

Ultimately, there’s a legal dialogue in what defines burglary. Burglary is the invasion of space. So, there needs to be a clear distinction of the boundaries of that space. This begs the philosophical question: what are those boundaries? Where does architecture start and end? Is it your property line? Is it the exterior edge of the cladding on your house? Is the center line of the threshold of your door? If you live in a multi-unit building, does it start in your lobby? I don’t have any answers here. I am scared of lawyers, and I don’t want to trigger a personal existential crisis. But these are important ideas to think about as we continue to shape and create buildings and urban landscapes.

Continuing on our enlightenment coffeehouse talk, we can look at our view of burglars that Manaugh brings up near the end of the book. He said that he approached the book with the hope that he could be a cheerleader for the person who flips architecture on its head, the person who keeps you on your toes, the person who stretches the ideas of architecture, the person who writes their own script. But, you can’t. Burglars are “assholes.“ They physically break architecture and emotionally destroy people’s sense of security, often scarring people for years to come.

I agree. Nobody wants to root for the bad guy (unless you watch Breaking Bad or Ozarks). But, as Manaugh shows throughout the book, there’s still an opportunity to learn. One of the big takeaways for me is this idea that burglars are some of the few people that create architecture, well after construction has ended. Most of us are purely consumers of architecture. We take the finished product and live with it. No doubt, we surely take advantage of it. It becomes a home. It becomes a place of productivity. Whatever it is for you, it becomes a collection of memories. But there’s a beauty to endlessly creating and changing architecture. Architecture shouldn’t be static, nor should our interactions be with it.

We, the normal people, approach a building and allow it to tell us what to do. Burglars are creators. They use a building to do what they (the burglars) want to do. Most people see walls as walls. The twisted few make walls into doors. Maybe we can all look at walls as more than walls. No, not as doors, but as a blank canvas, waiting to be painted.

Houses of Tomorrow

I just visited the Houses of Tomorrow: Solar Homes from Keck to Today exhibit at the Elmhurst Art Museum. Throughout my 3 years of graduate architecture school, I never heard of George Fred Keck, nor his brother, William. Maybe I just didn’t listen closely enough, but I think I was a pretty good student (hi mom). But anyway, I get excited any time I get to learn about a new architect, so it was a fun!

The Keck brothers were ahead of their time in technology. They are known as the first “solar architects,” harnessing the power of the sun to help passively condition indoor spaces. The principle is simple, but the execution is hard. The idea is that you want to let the sun inside during the colder months (to heat up the space) and keep the sun outside during the hotter months (make it easier on your cooling system - air conditioning or natural ventilation).

Passive Solar Orientation

Photo by Curt MacIver, Taken at Elmhurst Art Museum, Artist Unknown

The Keck brothers showed off their innovative, all-glass House of Tomorrow at the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair. It was a huge hit. The design was radical, and the new technology excited everyone for the amenable and luxurious domestic life to come. Initially, the attached garage was a hangar for a private airplane!

(The house was eventually moved to the Indiana lakeshore, where it is currently seeking a buyer to finance a multi-million dollar renovation plan in exchange for a 50-year lease. Anyone interested? Get it while it’s hot! Sorry, solar AND housing market joke in one.)

The second half of the gallery looked at the many private homes that the Keck brothers designed throughout their career. Mostly mid-century in style, they marketed their utility-bill-saving homes as both a financial and cultural investment. One of their larger homes was crescent shape (following the path of the sun), with the driveway running along side the interior curve. The scale and approach looked as though it could be a two-star hotel. But, most of the other homes were really beautiful - well-proportioned with nice outdoor space and fun brise-soleils.

George Fred Keck’s Crystal House was a different exploration. Its exposed exterior steel trusses no doubt influenced the future generation of high-tech architecture.

George Fred Keck's Crystal Home

Photo by Curt MacIver, Taken at Elmhurst Art Museum, Courtesy of Hedrich Blessing Studio

The curators speculate on how Keck also influenced his contemporaries. The exhibit explicitly pointed out parallels between George Fred Keck and Frank Lloyd Wright - the first being that they both have three names. No, but, FLW would eventually also design a crescent-shaped house - semi-similar in plan and function.

The exhibit remarks on emerging technologies (solar panels, high-performance windows, geothermal heat pumps, energy recovery ventilators, etc.) and current programs (LEED, PHIUS) that help the built environment limit its impact on the environment. It really is an exciting time to be a designer. It’s a challenging time but exciting time. There are so many tools and resources at your disposal.

The funny thing about the exhibit is that part of the associated art installation by Jan Tichy is housed in the adjacent building of the museum, which is Mies van der Rohe’s 1952 McCormick House. As I learned while studying in Crown Hall for multiples years, Mies’s design philosophy prioritizes design aesthetic and function, not (thermal) comfort. This discussion is worthy of an entire book, but it was an interesting - unintentionally entertaining - contrast to the museum’s exhibit.

This was my first visit to the museum, and I was pleasantly surprised. The building is really pretty, and the exhibit was well curated. It’s sad to see that these passive energy approaches have been around for almost 100 years in contemporary buildings, and they still don’t seem to be widely used. Why are net-zero energy buildings so sexy? Shouldn’t they be the status quo? Hopefully soon.

Schiller & Larkin

This past weekend, I went to Wrightwood 659’s Romanticism to Ruin: Two Lost Works of Sullivan & Wright. In a truly serendipitous fashion, this exhibit works really well with last week’s post. It’s a similar theme of temporary vs permanent architecture but shed in a different light. Let’s dive in.

Dank Adler & Louis Sullivan (Adler & Sullivan) and Frank Lloyd Wright (FLW) designed buildings that were seemingly permanent. (FLW was actually working for Adler & Sullivan in the time of Schiller, but that’s for a different history lesson). The respective clients had every intention, at the beginning, to build something that would stand the test of time. Schiller Building was a beautiful auditorium with offices above, breaking the ceiling of what a skyscraper should look like (height joke). The Larkin Building emerged with innovative building technology and reimagined interior office environment, including a new-to-the-time open floor plan. But in short, both buildings met the same fate with a wrecking ball. The permanent quickly became temporary. (Larkin was replaced by a surface parking lot, which is twist of the knife).

Both of these buildings mark a sad time in preservation history. Activists weren’t able to sway the decisions of the city nor private developers. However, the seemingly guilted retrospection of the Schiller Building did lead to a preservation movement here in Chicago that is still active, and successful, today (yay Thompson Center!).

With all of that said, I want to examine how this exhibit, in particular, has brought the buildings back into the permanent realm, after they had both been prematurely stripped of that identity, over 60 years ago. What are the tools that resurrected the Schiller and Larkin buildings’ permanence?

Documentation

The Schiller Building is a unique example of this because the city allowed a small team to document ‘existing conditions’ before the building was torn down. Extensive notes and photos documenting color, texture, material, etc all funnel into a fascinating, albeit sad, story of the dismantling process. The Larkin Building is a different tale. Photos of the finished product, both exterior and interior, circulate the architecture community, but not much was documented for the actual demolition. But nonetheless, all of this documentation becomes permanent, which breathes new life into the legacy of these buildings. (I’ll save you the philosophical debate of what these images represent and whether they themselves are a different entity of permanence)

Primary Sources

In the exhibit, original sketches, architectural details, and engineering drawings are displayed. As a 21st century draftsman (read: I use a computer), I am completely in awe of the craft behind these drawings. Every single drawing is a work of art. But I digress…. These drawings, like documentation, are permanent! Even if the building itself is not there anymore, these drawings communicate important design ideas and spatial details, at times better than what I think they would be in person.

Contemporary Fabrication

With the help of documentation and research (maybe those are one in the same), students and professionals were able to create replicas of various details from the Schiller Building. A full scale replica of some of the ornamental friezes (lights and colors included!) hung on the walls. A beautiful scale model of the entire Schiller building allows the temporary to become permanent (although, I am not sure of the future of the model). The interior space was 3D modeled, allowing for rendered fly through of the space. It was a great way to allow people to place themselves in the space, but I do wonder if their imagination could have done that for them. But, I think I am biased since I work and think that way all day long.

The exhibit was a great example of how to celebrate and honor a building’s legacy, even if the structure itself is not here anymore. It also highlights the importance of documentation and research. The Schiller portion of the exhibit was exhaustive (in a good way). The Larkin portion was lacking (they told more of the tale of the company than the building), but I imagine that’s just due to lack of resources. In short, recognizing the history of architecture (and how it is communicated!) is an important part of our architecture dialogue. With that foundation, then, we can start to understand how it impacts our present and future projects.

Devil in the White City

I just finished reading Devil in the White City (DWC) by Erik Larson. I know, I know. I am really late to this. With my passion for architecture and my connection to Chicago, I have been recommended this book many a time. I’m not really sure why it took me so long to finally pick it up. For fear of this becoming a personal journal entry, I’ll just quickly say that I had quite a dry spell of reading. But, I am getting back into it.

DWC is a fascinating book of two parallel stories - one of civic and cultural triumph; the other of psychopathic darkness and deceit. At this point, I think these stories are pretty well known, so I am not going to give a Spark Notes version (do people still use that?). However, I have a few thoughts after finishing the book.

Image courtesy of eriklarsonbooks.com

For the World’s Fair, it’s amazing to think how a temporary event with temporary structures can have such a long lasting impact on our society. Traditionally, we think of capital A Architecture as very permanent buildings. Residences, government offices, civic halls, and public infrastructure are all built to last for various financial and social incentives. Fortunately, the conversation around architecture is shifting towards recognizing temporary structures (i.e. transitional housing, art installations, etc) as equally important as the permanent structures. And DWC is a great example (although, it’s not really a contemporary one, but still relevant right?).

As an architecture nerd, I geeked out as Larson explicitly explains how the World’s Fair buildings were built. Instead of using the traditional stone, steel, and brick of the time, they opted for wood frames covered in staff (a mixture of plaster and jute that could stick to wood and be shaped to create the illusion of stone - p. 120) due to financial and time constraints- they were given a mere 6 months! But the impact of the event was lasting. For architecture, and in particular civic architecture, this revitalized an interest in neoclassicism leading to buildings across the country, showing off their columns and capitals.

With the uniformity of style, yet uniqueness of each building, the fair also introduced the idea that a city could in fact be a celebration of beauty, both at the building scale and the urban scale. After the fair ended, Daniel Burnham became one of the first modern day urban planners, working with many cities, including Chicago, Atlanta, etc.

I love this. It’s exciting to think how your impact can come from temporary things. You don’t need to build a building to make an impact. You don’t need to invent something to make an impact. In Burnham’s case, it was a heroic undertaking in scale and time. But still, he just needed to be crazy enough to have a vision and see it through, even though he knew this fair, nor the associated structures would stick around.

But with great power, comes great responsibility. Personal impact can also be dangerous and scary. H.H. Holmes, unfortunately and grotesquely, impacted many people’s lives. And he used architecture to do it. He created a labyrinth inside his “castle.” In this way, architecture is the supporting cast in a rather dark and twisted crime thriller. His castle was built with purpose, but it also was inevitably town down,

I hate to put a damper on the mood, but I feel like I needed to bring that up. It’s one of the main themes of the book; there is black where there is white; there is darkness where there is light. That’s life. But hopefully, we can shine that light a little brighter with architecture - temporary or permanent.

Restoration Hardware

This is an essay that I wrote almost exactly 2 years ago. It’s about the Restoration Hardware here in Gold Coast, Chicago. Before the world shut down. But I think it is still relevant - maybe even more so - as we think about how the world will look after these last 2 crazy years…

Restoration Hardware: Home

Welcome to my home!  Or is it your home?  Is it our home? Do we share it? Is it a home at all?

With feelings of warmth, amiability, and comfort, Restoration Hardware feels like a place you could call home. With every room capturing a different style, you could certainly find a place just for you. It’s that idea of customization via endless possibilities that is comforting and approachable.  And a sense of courtship from the personnel makes it feel like you should be there.

But then again, nobody (that I know) has a full service coffee and cocktail bar in their house. Oh and there’s the fact that there are strangers that make it feel less familiar.  The space, being a luxury furniture showroom, has the strong capability of feeling stuffy, elite, and pretentious, but it doesn’t.  Ironically, many of those showrooms push you away, making you feel like you don’t belong.  RH is quite the opposite.

The adaptive reuse element of the building historically grounds the showroom in the notable, residential Gold Coast neighborhood.  The scale of the rooms is inviting and known.  The minimalist qualities and the muted palettes of the furniture allow the spaces to be clean and approachable.

Unfortunately, the prices are not nearly as approachable or seemingly thoughtful, and the glass chandeliers hanging throughout all 4 floors seem a bit out of touch with hints of gaudiness.  RH hesitantly explained that those sources of light are meant to provide a contrast to the rest of the space and furniture.  I am a bit skeptical of that contrasting application, but I quickly forget about those smaller problems after spending a few minutes inside.

With the allure of tangible high design and robust spaces, people come from across the city and across the globe to come to Restoration Hardware.  Harvested from my own experiences, most people are not there to shop for furniture.  Most people are either dining at the restaurant, 3 Arts Club, or “browsing” the furniture (colloquial way of saying that they are daydreaming about one day being able to afford any of this stuff).

The coffee bar always has a slight buzz to it, serving lattes and cappuccinos in the morning and slowly transitioning to wine and bubbles in the afternoon.  Drink in hand, people meander through the store, stopping to sit down on a couch, touch a blanket, or stare at some shiny fixtures.  Frequently, they will find a more than welcoming nook and plop down.  They situate themselves to get comfortable, well knowing that they will be there for awhile.

Mind you, while all of this is happening, nobody is shooting a side glance or a judging look.  While there, you don’t second guess yourself on the etiquette of getting comfortable.  There is an understanding in RH that you can do whatever you want.  (Within reason, obviously.  RH told us that they do not allow interviews to be conducted, photoshoots to happen, or any other commercial activity to occur  without advanced express written consent.)

In a romantic notion, the space’s inclusivity is a nod to its former self.  The 3 Arts Club was a safe zone for emerging female artists, and the current showroom reflects a similar openness and approachability.

Occasionally, you will see an actual “customer” sit down with an interior designer.  Together, they sift through different textile options and bedroom layouts.  Every room is a different direction of design that hopefully inspires customers and designers alike to rethink their projects.

RH claims that they still have not totally reconciled the financial implications that come from many people being in the store that have no intention of buying furniture.  But that is the risk that is found in any good architecture.  It pushes the idea of what a good business should do.  It rethinks where revenue should stand on the list of priorities.  Architecture and business need to have a dialogue of the balance between revenue and program.

So what is the primary programmatic function of Restoration Hardware?  It seems quite obvious that the end goal is to sell furniture.  Then, what is the secondary programmatic function?  Is it to create a “third place” that is such a hot topic these days?  Is it to host a restaurant in the glazed, interior courtyard?  Maybe there is no attempted secondary function at all.

Speculation is a very dangerous (albeit fun) game, so I hesitate to question what the architects were striving for.  But, I also don’t think that actually matters.  There is only so much value in investigating what the architects intended.  The real treasure is in seeing what the space has become and how it is currently used.

Good architecture also doesn’t know what it wants to be.  No, seriously.  Good architecture is when the building or the space gives the agency back to the user.  It’s an outline for a set of ideas and principles, but it is not a script.

RH lays out a framework for social connection, conversation, and exploration.  Even more, through a more pedagogical lens, it pushes the user towards a more connected, thoughtful, and open way of living.

Social connection comes through the idea of shared space.  People always feel connected to those with which they share space.  There is a subconscious, yet intimate, common experience.  The fact that these spaces are open to people beyond just the normal customer is also an important notion for social connection.  Openness and approachability are the core pillars of positive social connection. 

Conversation is found in the drinks.  Whether it is coffee or wine, drinking is mostly a conversational activity.  It is a bonding moment for people.  Sharing a drink is like breaking bread together.  Conversation is threaded from the common experience, and it is amplified when there is endless comfortable furniture to occupy.

Exploration is in all of the different design ideas.  Each room offers a new perspective on layout, finishes, color, light, and more.  Whether you are a designer or a non-designer it is important to be reminded to look around the corner and think about different possibilities.

So, is Restoration Hardware a home?

I guess it’s a shared communal home?  But, honestly, who cares.  Shed away the label.  Shake off the glorified buzzword of “third place.”  It’s a place that prioritizes social connection, and that’s what matters.