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FATHER OF SKY SCRAPERS- LOUIS

SULLIVAN
INTRODUCTION

Louis Henry Sullivan also known as FATHER OF MODERN AMERICAN
ARCHITECTURE ( Born September 3, 1856 April 14, 1924) was
an American architect, and has been called the Father of Skyscrapers" and Father
of Modernism".
He is considered by many as the creator of the modern skyscraper, was an influential
architect and critic of the Chicago School, was a mentor to Frank Lloyd Wright, and
an inspiration to the Chicago group of architects who have come to be known as
the Prairie School.
EARLY LIFE AND CAREER
Louis Henry Sullivan was born to an Irish-born Father, Patrick Sullivan, and a
Swiss-born Mother, Ne Andrienne both of whom had immigrated to the United States
in the late 1840s.
After graduating from high school, Sullivan studied architecture briefly at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Learning that he could both graduate
from high school a year early and pass up the first two years at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology by passing a series of examinations, Sullivan entered
MIT at the age of sixteen.
After one year of study, he moved to Philadelphia and took a job with architect
Frank Furness.

MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
FRANK FURNESS
He worked for William LeBaron Jenney, the architect often credited with erecting the
first steel-frame building. After less than a year with Jenney, Sullivan moved
to Paris and studied at the cole des Beaux-Arts for a year.
He returned to Chicago and began work for the firm of Joseph S. Johnston & John
Edelman as a draftsman. Johnston & Edleman were commissioned for the design of
the Moody Tabernacle, with the interior decorative FRESCO SECCO" stencils
designed by Sullivan.
In 1879 Dankmar Adler hired Sullivan; a year later, he became a partner in the firm.
This marked the beginning of Sullivan's most productive years.
William LeBaron Jenney
FIRST STEEL FRAMED
BUILDING:
The Home Insurance Building
in Chicago built in 1885
RISE TO FAME
Adler and Sullivan initially achieved fame as THEATRE ARCHITECTS. While
most of their theaters were in Chicago, their fame won commissions as far west
as Pueblo, Colorado, and Seattle, Washington.
The culminating project of this phase of the firm's history was the 1889 Auditorium
Building (188690, opened in stages) in Chicago, an extraordinary mixed-use
building which included not only a 4,200-seat theater, but also a hotel and an office
building with a 17-story tower, with commercial storefronts at the ground level of the
building fronting Congress and Wabash Avenues.
1889 Auditoruim Building,Chicago built by Dankmar Alder and Louis Sullivan it opened in phases
1889 Auditoruim Building-Interior
LOUIS SULLIVAN-BELIEF
Louis H. Sullivan joined the office of Dankmar Adler in 1879, soon becoming
Adler's partner. Their 14-year association produced more than 100 buildings, many
of them landmarks, such as the Auditorium Building in Chicago and the Wainwright
Building in St. Louis. He considered it obvious that building design should indicate a
building's functions, hence his influential dictum FORM FOLLOWS
FUNCTIONS.
In 1891 the Wainwright building was constructed for st.Louis businessman ELLIS WAIN
WRIGHT. It was designed by LOUIS SULLIVAN. The Wainwright building is the farther of
contemporary skyscraper. Sullivans design emphasized open spacious interiors.
DESIGN PHILOSOPHY
Marcus Vitruviu Pollio the Roman architect, engineer and author who first asserted in his
book De architectura that a structure must exhibit the three qualities of firmitas, utilitas,
venustas that is, it must be SOLID,USEFULL and BEAUTIFULL.
But Sullivan himself neither thought nor designed along such dogmatic lines during the peak of
his career. Indeed, while his buildings could be spare and crisp in their principal masses, he often
punctuated their plain surfaces with eruptions of lush Art Nouveau and something like Celtic
Revival decorations, usually cast in iron or terra cotta, and ranging from organic forms like vines
and ivy, to more geometric designs, and interlace, inspired by his Irish design heritage.
Terra cotta is lighter and easier to work with than stone masonry. Sullivan used it in his
architecture because it had a malleability that was appropriate for his ornament.
Probably the most famous example is the writhing green ironwork that covers the entrance
canopies of the Carson Pirie Scott store on South State Street.
FRESCO SECCO" stencils Designed By Louis Sullivan
Writhing green ironwork that covers the
entrance canopies of the Carson Pirie Scott
store on South State Street- Chicago, Illinois
Ornamentation design on
Union Trust building in
St.Louis
Louis Sullivan Designs
THE MOST FAMOUS BUILDING BUILT BY-
LOUIS SULLIVAN AND DANKMAR ADLER
Another signature element of Sullivan's work is the massive, semi-circular arch. Sullivan
employed such arches throughout his careerin shaping entrances, in framing windows, or
as interior design.
All of these elements can be found in Sullivan's widely-admired Guaranty Building, which
he designed while partnered with Adler. Completed in 1895, this office building in Buffalo,
New York is in the Palazzo style.
Visibly divided into three "zones" of design: a plain, wide-windowed base for the ground-
level shops; the main office block, with vertical ribbons of masonry rising unimpeded across
nine upper floors to emphasize the building's height; and an ornamented cornice perforated
by round windows at the roof level, where the building's mechanical units (like the elevator
motors) were housed. The cornice crawls with Sullivan's trademark Art Nouveau vines; each
ground-floor entrance is topped by a semi-circular arch.

GUARANTY BUILDING-DESIGN
DETAIL
WORLDS COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION
In 1890 Sullivan was one of the ten architects, from Eastern and Western U.S.,
chosen to build a major structure for the "White City", the World's Columbian
Exposition, held in Chicago in 1893. Sullivan's massive Transportation Building and
huge arched "Golden Door" stood out as the only building not of the current Beaux-
Arts style, and the only multicolored facade in the White City. Sullivan was later
(1922) to claim that the fair set the course of American architecture back "for half a
century from its date, if not longer. His was the only building to receive extensive
recognition outside America, receiving three medals from the Union Centrale des
Arts Decoratifs the following year.


The World's Columbian Exposition, also known as The Chicago World's Fair was a
World's Fair held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher
Columbus' arrival in the New World in 1492
DECLINE OF LOUIS SULLIVAN
By the end of the first decade of the 20th century, Sullivan's star was well on the
descent and for the remainder of his life his output consisted primarily of a series of
small bank and commercial buildings in the Midwest. Yet a look at these buildings
clearly reveals that Sullivan's muse had not abandoned him. When the director of a
bank that was considering hiring him asked Sullivan why they should engage him at
a cost higher than the bids received for a conventional Neo-Classic styled building
from other architects, Sullivan is reported to have replied, "A thousand architects
could design those buildings. Only I can design this one." He got the job. Today
these commissions are collectively referred to as Sullivan's "Jewel Boxes." All are
still standing.
LAST STAGES OF LOUIS SULLIVAN
He went into a twenty-year-long financial and emotional decline, beset by a shortage
of commissions, chronic financial problems and alcoholism. He obtained a few
commissions for small-town Midwestern banks wrote books, and in 1922 appeared
as a critic of Raymond Hood's winning entry for the Tribune Tower competition. He
died in a Chicago hotel room on April 14, 1924. He left a wife, Mary Azona
Hattabaugh, from whom he was separated. A modest headstone marks his final
resting spot in Graceland Cemetery in Chicago's Uptown and Lake View
neighborhoods. A monument was later erected in Sullivan's honor, a few feet from
his headstone.


Buildings 18871895 by Adler & Sullivan:
Martin Ryerson Tomb, Graceland Cemetery, Chicago (1887)
Auditorium Building, Chicago (1889)
Carrie Eliza Getty Tomb, Graceland Cemetery, Chicago (1890)
Wainwright Building, St. Louis (1890)
Charlotte Dickson Wainwright Tomb, Bellefontaine Cemetery, St. Louis (1892) which is listed
on the National Register of Historic Places

is considered a major American architectural
triumph, a model for ecclesiastical architecture, a "masterpiece",

and has been called "the Taj
Mahal of St. Louis." Interestingly, the family name appears nowhere on the tomb.
Union Trust Building (now 705 Olive), St. Louis (1893; street-level ornament heavily altered
1924)
Guaranty Building (formerly Prudential Building), Buffalo (1894)

Buildings 18871895 by Louis Sullivan, with Dankmar Adler until 1895:
Springer Block (later Bay State Building and Burnham Building) and Kranz Buildings,
Chicago (18851887)
Selz, Schwab & Company Factory, Chicago (18861887)
Hebrew Manual Training School, Chicago (18891890)
James H. Walker Warehouse & Company Store, Chicago (18861889)
Warehouse for E. W. Blatchford, Chicago (1889)
James Charnley House (also known as the CharnleyPersky House Museum Foundation and
the National Headquarters of the Society of Architectural Historians), Chicago (18911892)
Albert Sullivan Residence, Chicago (18911892)
McVicker's Theater, second remodeling, Chicago (18901891)

REFERENCES
www.Britannica.com
Science.howstuffworks.com
www.biography.com
www.Wikipedia.org
Architecture.about.com





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