INSIDE GREAT CHICAGO BUILDINGS PATRICK F. CANNON PHOTOGRAPHS by JAMES CAULFIELD 1
Edgar Miller Edgar Miller (1899 1993) was an artist in the broadest possible definition. He drew, painted, sculpted, carved, designed and did almost all of it with his own labor. No tools were foreign to him, including hammer, saw, and chisel. Everything he did was personal and handmade. Not formally trained as an architect, he became as much of one as necessary to realize his visions. Miller was born in Idaho Falls, Idaho. His mother, Hester, was a schoolteacher, and his father, James Edgar, was a jeweler, watchmaker, and optometrist who would later become a beekeeper. While the frontier may have been closed by the turn of the century, Idaho would have seemed like the frontier to a young boy. Miller lived an outdoor life steeped in nature and hard work. He greatly admired local eccentric Ozro French Eastman, known as Jo He, for his ability to put his hand to nearly everything and make an artistic statement. His parents both had artistic temperaments, which all of their children inherited to some extent. Among the five siblings, Lucille was a lapidary artist, Frank a woodcarver, Hester a church decorator. From the start, however, it was clear that Edgar had special talent. But in 1913 Miller left for Australia to raise bees with his father and brother. Here was the real frontier, and Miller busily sketched almost everything he saw. The trip, however, was not a total success. Drought killed many of the bees, and the trio found themselves doing odd jobs to survive. Finally, fearing Miller would be drafted into the Australian army to serve in World War I, his mother sent fare for the return trip. He finished high school and earned a scholarship to the Art Institute of Chicago (see p. 148), beginning his classes in 1917. But the war caught up with the United States, and he briefly served in the Army before returning to the Art Institute in 1919. Miller left before graduating (he would later return to the Art Institute as a teacher). He took a job with Alfonso Iannelli, whose design studio would produce an incredible variety of work, including architectural decorations for architects such as Frank Lloyd Wright, Barry Byrne, and, as late as 1955, Naess & Murphy. In 1927, classmate Sol Kogen came to Miller with the idea of repurposing an old apartment building and stable, in what is now called Old Town, into artist studios. In their book Edgar Miller and the Hand-Made Home, Richard Cahan and Michael Williams wrote, Miller and Kogen eventually conceived a plan to rebuild the apartment house as six duplex studios, to build a new structure with two duplex studios up front and to convert the stable into a huge studio. That huge studio became the R. W. Glasner Studio, and it became Miller s masterpiece. From the front door, which Miller carved, to each of the home s four levels, his touch is evident. While there are elements of art deco and even English Tudor styles, it s clear that the vision is one artist s alone. Unfortunately, that vision is within a private home, a place few people will ever see. But thanks to Cahan and Williams s wonderful book, and our modest addition, it can at least be enjoyed secondhand. 1928 Modern Eclectic 2
3
Left: This typical floor shows the glass-block floors and bridges as well as the apartment windows that open onto the light court. Below: Details of decorative columns. Above: The floors rising above. Right: The column capitals and beams are highly decorated, and the floor and bridge beams are lined with bulbs for illumination at night or on darker days. 4
5
Previous: Frank Lloyd Wright was commissioned in 1905 to remodel the lobby area; more recently, the skylight was returned to its original transparency. Left: The staircase rises above the balcony level to the top of the light court. Above: The light court, common in buildings of this period, was glazed in white to reflect even more light into inside offices. Right: A view of the skylight and staircase from the lobby. 6
INSIDE GREAT CHICAGO BUILDINGS PATRICK F. CANNON PHOTOGRAPHS by JAMES CAULFIELD For the first time, the interiors of some of the Chicago area s greatest buildings, designed by celebrated architects, are brought together and featured in truly stunning original photographs. These Chicago-area homes, religious spaces, and commercial and public structures give visual meaning to Frank Lloyd Wright s belief that the space within becomes the reality of the building. Beginning with the Clarke House of 1836 and continuing to the present, every type and style of building is presented. Famous residences such as Wright s Robie House and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe s Farnsworth House are here, but so are more modest (and not so modest) homes by Walter Burley Griffin, George Washington Maher, and Paul Schweikher. The ornate warmth of Adler & Sullivan s Auditorium Building provides striking contrast to the modern, towering underground stacks of Helmut Jahn s Mansueto Library. The soaring Bahá í Temple by Louis Bourgeois is elegantly highlighted alongside a humble chapel in St. Procopius Abbey Church by Edward Dart. And commercial buildings by Daniel Burnham, John Wellborn Root, John Holabird, Martin Roche, and many more reaffirm Morton Wing, Art Institute of Chicago; Shaw, Metz & Associates, 1962. 8 Chicago s position as a great business center. These architects and their contemporaries have made the Chicago area a mecca for both architects and lovers of architecture from around the world. Text by author Patrick F. Cannon, who has lived and worked in Chicago and its suburbs for more than sixty years, discusses each building s architecture, architect, and place in history. James Caulfield, a noted architectural photographer, leads a visual tour into both the intimate and grand interiors of the Chicago area s finest buildings. The Space Within, the duo s fifth book, demonstrates that good design comes in many styles. While many of these architectural masterpieces are open to the public, others particularly the private homes can only be seen here. About the Author Patrick F. Cannon has had a long career as a publicist, journalist, and editor. He is the author of Hometown Architect: The Complete Buildings of Frank Lloyd Wright in Oak Park and River Forest, Illinois; Prairie Metropolis: Chicago and the Birth of a New American Home; Frank Lloyd Wright s Unity Temple: A Good Time Place; and Louis Sullivan: Creating a New American Architecture, all published by Pomegranate. He has also led tours of Chicago-area architecture for nearly forty years. About the Photographer James Caulfield has been a commercial and advertising photographer for thirty years, working from his natural-light studio in downtown Chicago. He has donated more than five hundred images to the Society of Architectural Historians, as well as to the Glessner House and Clarke House museums, the Unity Temple Restoration Foundation, and the Richard Nickel Committee. He continues to work for the Frank Lloyd Wright Trust to document their sites, and for many years he photographed the buildings included on the famous Wright Plus house walks. Above: Chicago Cultural Center; Shepley, Rutan & Coolidge, 1897. Front cover: The Rookery; Burnham & Root, 1888. A view of the light court staircase from above. First spread: R. W. Glasner Studio; Edgar Miller, 1928. Second spread: Brewster Apartments; Enoch Hill Turnock, 1893. Last spread: The Rookery; Burnham & Root, 1888. 320 pp., 113/4 x 9 in. Smyth-sewn casebound, with jacket More than 360 full-color photographs A242 ISBN 978-0-7649-7205-8 $65.00 US ($80.00 Canada) Available February 2016 Text 2016 Patrick F. Cannon Photographs 2016 James Caulfield Pomegranate Communications, Inc. 19018 NE Portal Way, Portland OR 97230 800 227 1428 www.pomegranate.com Pomegranate Europe Ltd. Unit 1, Heathcote Business Centre, Hurlbutt Road Warwick, Warwickshire CV34 6TD, UK [+44] 0 1926 430111 sales@pomeurope.co.uk Printed in China