Two Franks and one city.

I flew to NYC to sit on a bench. Actually, that’s an exaggeration. I flew to NYC to ogle a bench. Not just any bench, but a polished aluminum wing-like creation by Frank Gehry. The architect created this one-of-a-kind item with Emeco, the folks who make indestructible aluminum chairs like the 1006 Navy® Chair.

Included in the Sotheby’s Important 20th Century Design auction on June 12, the bench was available for preview in the days before. I went to see Tuyomyo (the name of the bench, which means “yours and mine”) and arrived in a bubble of ladies-who-lunch, walking en masse through the gallery. With the exception of one woman who used the mirror-like bench to check her lipstick, none of them tested the bench for its ability to position two sitters facing each other so they can converse. And conversing was not something these women were afraid to do. Instead, they gave “the tush test” (their words) to the nearby Maria Pergay “Target” Chairs (final hammer price: $32,500 for the pair).

Perhaps you have to be a hard ass to understand the auction world.

As for the Gehry bench, Sotheby’s estimated selling price was $250,000 to $350,000, and when the final bid did not meet the reserve (it was very close), Emeco donated the bench to the Hereditary Disease Foundation. In 1968, Berta and Frank Gehry helped establish this Foundation for research in genetic and brain disorders. All proceeds from the sale of the bench will go to the Foundation’s Leslie Gehry Brenner Award for Innovation in Science, a research fund established in honor of the Gehry’s late daughter. “Interested buyers should contact the Foundation,” says Emeco’s Dan Fogelson, who’s already got his hands full selling $400 aluminum Navy chairs.

From a sinuous bench to a swirling museum, the next Frank on my list was Mr. Wright who’s having a banner year. There’s a novel out about his form-follows-function love life, and the Guggenheim, which he designed, is featuring an exhibit of his work. The NYC landmark was completed 50 years ago, and this is the first FLLW exhibit within his circling walls. Perhaps it’s true that “the mother art is architecture,” as FLLW would say.

I’m a wall-hugger at the Guggenheim. I fear that a suctioning force will come from the void in the center and pull me down, like a giant toilet flushing, dragging with it tourists, tchotchkes and works of art. The white porcelain-like walls don’t help alleviate this sensation, and as if Wright recognized this, the toilet in this restroom appears to have been installed with a wink and a smile. 

Embracing my vertigo, I took the elevator to the top floor and worked my way down through the museum’s spiraling ramp. This is the Wright way, and how he intended the space to be experienced, but the museum – in some sort of Guggenheim guffaw – arranged the FLLW exhibit to start at the bottom. Write to me if you know why. Security grumbled when I asked.

The Guggenheim followed me to lunch at Elmo, where there’s a painting by Robert Loughlin, an artist with a story that’s as interesting as his work. Actually, make that two stories. Story one, as told by the maitre d’, is that Loughlin is a homeless man who has been painting the same face of his late boyfriend since the 1970s. Story two, as I discovered in my research, is that Loughlin works in antiques and the face is actually his boyfriend Gary, who he has been with since the 1980s. Either way, this macho face with cigarette is compelling, and I imagine that what he’s saying about the Guggenheim is: “Start from the top. Work your way down.” 

And if being followed by the work of one Frank wasn’t enough, I was also followed by Gehry, as I could see his IAC Building from my hotel room. (You can also get a great look at it from the High Line, which I’ll discuss in the next Design Notes.)

Gwendolyn Horton

Iridescent California.

In San Francisco’s Castro neighborhood there is a giant rainbow flag, and flying above it today is a banner in black, the color of mourning and judges’ robes. The mood in California is prickly, and as I work in my office, surrounded by swatches of fabric and leather in a spectrum of colors, I find that I’m thinking about rainbows. Not in a unicorn or pot of gold kind of way, but in a humanity kind of way, and in terms of the symbols chosen to express our beliefs.

The rainbow flag made its debut at the San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Freedom Day Parade in 1978. Gilbert Baker designed and hand-sewed the first flag for his friend Harvey Milk, who was assassinated later that year. “I will always remember Harvey riding through the streets under the giant rainbow flag waving to the crowds,” said Baker. “It was an incredible moment of joy and we all felt that we were going to change the world.”

Originally made with eight stripes – pink for sexuality; red for life; orange for healing; yellow for sun; green for nature; blue for art; indigo for harmony; and violet for spirit – the combination proved impossible to mass produce because hot pink (always the drama queen) was not commercially available in nylon. The flag was reduced to seven stripes, and then to six after Harvey Milk was murdered. Following that tragedy, Baker’s flag was the symbol needed to demonstrate the unity of the community, but because the Pride Parade Committee of 1979 wanted to hang the flag from light posts with the stripes divided evenly, the indigo stripe (sorry harmony) was removed so there would be three colors on each side.

Today, these six stripes are recognized by the International Congress of Flag Makers (a colorful group, I’m sure), and used worldwide as a symbol of gay rights and LGBT pride. When researching this story, I came across a Leather Pride Flag which at first I thought would be a great idea to support our upholstery collections, until I realized that the pride that flag symbolizes has more to do with bedroom furniture.

No matter what your beliefs, or your feelings about this week’s decision by the California supreme court justices (I’m lowercasing them because I can), I encourage you to keep an eye out for rainbows. Even if you’re like a guy I saw waiting for the commuter ferry recently who, as a rainbow draped itself over our foggy city, called his wife and told her to look out the window. His right to marriage will never be challenged, but he recognized the beauty of a rainbow, and that gives me hope that people’s hearts and eyes are still open.

Gwendolyn Horton

Otis, my man.

Some of the most heated discussions I’ve been involved in at DWR have been over naming products. People take this very seriously, and yet, we all know that the name is forgotten as soon as the customer gets the product home. I seriously doubt that anyone says “Andrew, how many times do I have to ask you to get your elbows off the Spanna Extension Table and put your Fog Linen Napkin on your lap? Shape up or I’ll send you to your Matera Bed with Storage without dinner.”

Dare to dream, DWR.

At least I don’t have to name cars. This morning I idled behind a Toyota Rogue (are they kidding?) and pitied the poor bastard who came up with that one. Actually, make that two poor bastards. Toyota used the name in the 1980s and Nissan recently slapped it on the back tailgate of their compact SUV.

Nail polish colors would be fun to name, and I’d suggest the name “Less is more,” in case anyone from Revlon is reading. Naming lingerie would also be enjoyable (again, I suggest “Less is more” as the name).

At DWR, the name “Otis” was recently suggested for a new table we’ll be introducing. My mind immediately went to elevators and “Otis, my man!” in Animal House. Generally, we try to avoid using personal names because: 1. It’s too much like other retailers, and 2. If a customer has a bad association with a name – an ex-boyfriend or a mean boss, for example – then that product is not going to elicit feelings of serenity and relaxation.

Of course, we make exceptions, so you can stay seated in your Ray Club Chair and keep reading rather than emailing me to point out this fact. (That goes for you lounging on the Albert Sofa as well.) So, I gave some thought to Otis. Mostly I wondered how Otis Elevators got their name. It turns out that Otis was the last name of the man who founded the company in 1853. Elisha Graves Otis did not invent the elevator, but rather, he invented a safety mechanism that prevented these “lifting platforms” from plummeting to the ground. (Kudos to them for not choosing to use his middle name.)

The company made its first elevator sale to a furniture factory at 275 Hudson Street in New York City. The price was $300, and it was partially paid for with a cannon. Otis elevators were originally powered by steam, in the 1870s they switched to hydraulic elevators that relied on water pressure, and in 1889 the first electric elevator was installed. This innovative company also solved the problem of how to install an elevator into the curved lower legs of the Eiffel Tower. The solution was a hybrid of sorts – part elevator, part inclined railroad similar to funicular lifts used on steep hillsides. The Otis machines went into service in 1889 in the north and south pillars, only to be dismounted in 1910. The relationship between the Otis Company and Gustave Eiffel had its ups and downs (forgive the pun), causing dramatic statements like, “we have borne and suffered and achieved on your behalf,” to be written to one another. Read more about it on the Otis website.

As far as naming conventions, the elevator had its awkward moments, from “ascending rooms” (apparently they did not descend) to “hoisting apparatus” which was the name Otis used in his 1861 patent. For our table at DWR, we named it the Metric Table – look for it in June. The name Otis will remain in my tickler file, in the event that we introduce a table or chair that’s height adjustable. For insights about our own name – Design Within Reach – read a recent blog post by our CEO.

Gwendolyn Horton

Digging up dirt on John Deere.

My aunt and uncle recently sent me pictures taken on Maine Maple Sunday, an event that includes maple syrup tasting. My guess is that this process is a bit like wine tasting in Napa, but with more sugar and no hangover. It was fun to see photos of my syrup-tipsy family, but what really caught my eye was the John Deere tractor with the vat of maple sap in back.

According to my aunt, this “modern hauling vehicle” replaced the horse and sled that were traditionally used for transporting the sap. It takes 40 gallons of maple sap to make one gallon of pure maple syrup, but I have no doubt that John Deere is up to the task.

Indulging my passion for these green-and-yellow machines (what is it about them that reminds me of basketball uniforms?), I researched John Deere and discovered that the future-founder of the farm-machinery conglomerate began his career as a blacksmith in Illinois. In 1836, he was approached by a group of farmers who asked, “How can we stop the #&*$%! soil from jamming up our #&*$%! plows?”

Deere quickly recognized that cast iron wasn’t the right material for cultivating the sticky soil in the Midwest, so in 1837 he introduced his “self-polishing” plow made of steel that the soil would not adhere to. Combining innovative thinking with an expertise in materials, Deere solved the farmers’ problem. Today his steel plow is archived at the Smithsonian.

Fast forward 100 years and countless happy farmers later, the John Deere Company decided to design a new building for its Moline, Illinois, headquarters. With a goal to create something that was unique but also reflected the character of the company, their choice of architects was none other than Eero Saarinen.

Staying true to Deere’s legacy, Saarinen designed the building in steel. Not polished steel like the plow, but rather Cor-ten® steel, a material that had never before been used in architecture. When this material is left unpainted, “a rust coating forms which becomes a protective skin over the steel itself,” explained Saarinen. This corrosion-resistant coating gives the steel an earthy color that the folks at John Deere describe as being “much like newly plowed soil.”

If you know anything about Saarinen, you know that one of his greatest strengths was the ability to express a client’s identity through architecture. That talent is made even more notable here by the fact that the architect died in 1961, two years before the John Deere building was completed. If you’d like to see the structure, it’s open to visitors 365 days a year. In addition to marveling at Saarinen’s work, be sure to check out the 180-foot-long mural by Alexander Girard. This three-dimensional timeline depicts the company’s first 75 years of operation, from 1837 to 1918, and contains 2,200 pieces of memorabilia (it would take a genius like Girard to make that look interesting). And of course, be sure to check out the displays of John Deere products.

Gwendolyn Horton

Anniversaries and such.

It seems hard for me to believe, but we are in our tenth year. It certainly has been an interesting journey. When we launched our little company in 1999, it was a catalog with a website, and while we believed it should work, who really knows until you push the small tyke out of the nest. In fact, we had a bit of a scare after we mailed our first book and the phone hadn’t started to ring. Perhaps junior wasn’t the budding genius we thought he would be. But then our CEO at the time noticed that no one had turned off the phone night service, so all the calls were going to voicemail. As soon as we switched it over, the calls started pouring in and we began to feel better about our little venture.

Over the next 10 years we lived through the dotcom bubble (which helped get us going – thank you Steve and Bill) and the bursting of said bubble, which was far less pleasant. But as the saying goes, what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. The next few years were relatively uneventful and we enjoyed rather nice growth (thank you DWR customers and design enthusiasts). Then we were all shocked by the events of September 11, 2001. We were rocked to our very core and the job of selling chairs suddenly seemed far less significant. But before long we did what all people do. We mourned, we contemplated the meaning of it all and we got back to living.

Today we are working our way through an economic situation that is unprecedented in the recent history of our nation. Many people have lost their jobs and many more are concerned about the future. Our little company has certainly not gone untouched by these events. We have reduced our workforce by 30%, and our overall expenses by even more. For the last six months, our products have been on sale constantly in order to generate revenue and reduce inventories. All of this has been trying, but it has positioned us well to have a very good chance of celebrating our 20th anniversary too.

So, when our team was trying to decide how to best celebrate this milestone, it was suggested (and widely agreed upon) that we provide the people who helped us get here (that would be you folks) an opportunity to enhance their surroundings. Starting tomorrow, we will be offering you a never-seen-before (and perhaps not repeated for another decade) offer. We’ve never offered this kind of discount on our entire assortment, and you get free shipping to boot.

Over the next few weeks, you will be hearing more about what we have been up to during the last few months and what you can continue to expect in the future. For certain, it includes honesty in all we do and it does not include continuing with deep discounts. Because deep discounts indicate one of two things: Either the company that is doing the discounting is liquidating – as in “bye bye” – or their prices are artificially inflated to allow this deep discounting, which we consider less than honest.

So, we would like to get a dialogue going with all of you about pricing, quality, what you need and what we can do to bring it all together, within a framework that is DWR. What does that mean? Well, simply put, it is about the value of smart design. Staying true to the fundamental tenets of modernism, we will expand upon our ability to satisfy your need for lasting value, with products that satisfy our standards of quality and design.

So stay tuned – and let us know what you think. In the meantime, preshop our Anniversary Sale (it starts at midnight).

Thanks,

Ray Brunner
CEO

Giving a hand to the tools we use.

When it comes to utilitarian objects, which do you prefer: beauty or brains? I agree, both would be ideal, and having both is possible, but for this example, you have to choose. When it comes to the tools you use every day, do you reach for them because they’re attractive or because you like how they work?

I was in an Apple store recently, watching how customers react to products on the shelves. In that sleek white environment, everything begs to be touched, picked up and held. Thumbs spin iPod wheels, index fingers stroll across iPhone screens, palms roll track balls to and fro. It’s a den of fondling. And it occurred to me that what Apple has so brilliantly done, is reconnected us to the joy of play. There is great appeal in fooling around with something that is accessible and easy to use. 

 

Which made me wonder about objects that aren’t technology-based. Can something as mundane as a saltshaker, for example, elicit the same sense of playful fascination? More importantly, can it do so without sacrificing functionality? I know you’ve heard of Steve Jobs. Now let me introduce you to Beat Wietlisbach.

Wietlisbach’s story (you knew there had to be a story) begins in 1997, when he was traveling around New Zealand. Among his backpacking gear was a stash of salt, which he kept in a 35mm film canister. As you’ve already guessed, one day the top of the canister popped off, and salt was scattered throughout his gear and unmentionables. After a few choice words and a bit of foot stomping, Wietlisbach finished his trip salt-free, and began work on a new kind of saltshaker. 

His goal was to create a spill-proof container that keeps contents dry, clean and hygienic, in any environment. The first prototype was made of aluminum, which was very strong, but too heavy to be practical for travel. Wietlisbach pursued various types of plastics, and returned home to Switzerland to work with experts in natural and synthetic compound technologies. When a solution was found in food-grade polymer, a prototype was sent off with the Swiss Alpine members, who spent two years in the field (budget control anyone?) testing Wietlisbach’s saltshaker.

Using feedback from the field, Wietlisbach made his design even smarter. For starters, he made the two caps differently shaped to help differentiate salt and pepper, even in the dark. Like the Apple products mentioned earlier, as soon as this saltshaker is in your hand, everything about it is intuitive. And for me, there’s something in its spring-loaded caps and sleek clear body that elicits a feeling of play. Wietlisbach also made it possible to unscrew the shaker heads to transform the container into an airtight and watertight case for pills. (For others, this might be how it elicits a feeling of play.)

Ever since it proved it could stand up to the rigors of the Matterhorn, the Swiss Salt and Pepper Shaker has been used in expeditions worldwide, including treks across the frozen Arctic with Marc Cornelissen and up Mt. Everest with Wilco de Rooij. Its most recent voyage brought it to Design Within Reach.

One more thing, should you have drawers full of old film canisters, the following “recipe” might be a fun way to put them to use. It could also serve as a way to signal for help, should you get lost in the woods, carrying all your old film canisters.

Film Canister Rocket
You’ll need:
-An empty 35mm plastic film canister and lid (it’s rumored that the semitransparent canisters work best)
-One Alka-Seltzer tablet
-Water
-Safety goggles

How to create your rocket:
1. Put on your goggles
2. Put one half of the antacid tablet in the canister
3. Add a teaspoon of water to the canister
4. Quickly put on the cap and snap it tightly
5. Quickly put it cap-side-down and step back
In a few seconds, the film canister will launch into the air. In the event of a misfire, wait at least 30 seconds before approaching the canister. Launching the rocket outdoors is recommended.

A 1949 Chair Returns in 2008.

“Are you a manufacturer now?” asked Jens Risom when we invited him to create something for Design Within Reach. Our reply was a simple yes, and the project was under way. We soon learned that Risom wasn’t so much asking us a question as he was stating a requirement. After he worked with Hans Knoll in the early 1940s, Risom created his own company, and for 25 years he designed, manufactured and sold furniture for the residential and commercial markets. He built his business and reputation by maintaining control of his work from concept to completion, and Risom wasn’t about to work with DWR if he couldn’t be sure that this would continue to be true.

DWR Design Studio works in collaboration with designers to fix problems that either haven’t been solved by other products or can be solved in smarter ways. Our work with Jens Risom had two components: first, to bring back a 1949 chair and ottoman that Risom designed for the Caribe Hilton Hotel in Puerto Rico and second, to expand the collection with a new bench. The challenge in bringing the chair back into production was how to keep its balance and light scale, but use modern production techniques to keep manufacturing costs in check.

Risom, at age 92, inspired us with his ideas through every step of the process, from reviewing prototypes to adjusting tiny details to advocating cost-effective changes in the manufacturing process. When he saw one of the first prototypes, he knocked on the wood, shook his head and said, “This is quarter-inch. Use three-eighths.” Changes like this not only improved the aesthetics and structure, they also gave us better board yield so we could make the most of the materials used.

The Jens Armchair and Ottoman look the same as the ones made in 1949, but thanks to Risom’s input, they are smarter solutions that take advantage of resources and tools that weren’t available 60 years ago. The addition of the new Bench makes the Jens Collection suitable for an entryway or waiting area, and by leaving a portion of the wood surface exposed, the Bench offers a seat and a side table in one streamlined piece.

The Jens Collection is made in the U.S. and, like all of the furniture by this iconic designer, has a subtle Scandinavian sensibility that works with modern and traditional settings. Or, as Risom puts it, “Good design means that anything good will go well with other equally good things.”

Drawing circles in square peg times.

I stayed at a hotel recently that had porthole-shaped windows – 11 floors of them. It was the Swiss cheese of building facades. But looking at the view of New York City from my private bubble of a hotel room got me thinking about how times of “roundness” come and go in design, creating a dotted line, so to speak, from one design period to the next.

The theory of psycho-geometrics uses shapes to identify different personality types, and people defined as “circles” are those who others bring their problems to. You may have heard of these theories if you’ve ever taken a Myers-Briggs test (if you feel like you’re the last to know about this, you’re probably a “rectangle” personality), and I wonder if designers are drawn to round shapes – the “personalities” we bring our problems to – at times of uncertainty or stress.

And while uncertain times inevitably pass, there are examples of round designs that endure, even through times when we think being round is square. An example of this is a logo that Paul Rand designed for the American Broadcasting Company in 1962, which is still in use today. “In order to understand the aesthetic in its ultimate and approved forms,” wrote Rand in Design, Form and Chaos, “one must begin with it in the raw; in the events and scenes that hold the attentive eye and ear of man.”

It is suggested that the typeface Rand used was based on the simplified shapes of the Bauhaus, the German school that emerged in 1919, also a time of global uncertainty. It was in 1920 that another example of enduring round design was created: Eileen Gray’s concentric glass table, which she designed for her sister who loved to eat breakfast in bed. It’s a table that uses a shape associated with comfort to fulfill a need for providing comfort.

Round shapes are symbols of unity and, while no one would call New York’s Guggenheim Museum cozy, its top-to-bottom experience does elicit a feeling of togetherness. There is something comforting in how its spiral architecture clarifies the path you should take, especially when compared to museums that send visitors wandering and retracing steps through a maze of interconnected rooms. Designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, the museum opened in 1959, amid a country struggling for integration and civil rights.

Returning to my earlier mention of portholes, the comfort provided by these round shapes in ships is quite literal, in that portholes bring light and air to a ship’s lower quarters. Plus, a round window is stronger than a square one since corners are stress points that can weaken and crack under the force of waves. Another function of being round, such as the design of a manhole cover, is that it is impossible for a round cover to fall into a round hole. “As far as I know,” wrote George Nelson in How to See, “the design [of round manhole covers] is used all over the world. The reason is simply that no one has ever come up with anything better.”

It remains to be seen how much “roundness” (or desire to be at sea, or hiding in a manhole) will come out of the current conditions of uncertainty, but if you’re lucky enough to own a front-loading washer with porthole opening, don’t be surprised if you start to find comfort in doing laundry.

Click here to see more photos.

Cubes on dunes: Exploring modern houses on Cape Cod.

On a recent canoe trip in Wellfleet, Massachusetts, my writer’s eye should have been on the cottage of John Newcomb, who was the “old Wellfleet oysterman” whom Thoreau wrote about in Cape Cod. But I have to admit, I was more intrigued by the house on the west side of the pond. Built 100 years after Thoreau’s visit, it is the 1948 cottage that Marcel Breuer designed for his own family. The structure is a series of rectangular boxes connected by a cantilevered porch, and while it’s interesting that something so organized can also appear casual, this house was not the reason for my trip to the Cape.

Bringing up the stern of the canoe (and politely correcting my urban paddling techniques) was Peter McMahon, executive director of the Cape Cod Modern House Trust, who invited me to see some of the properties they’re working to preserve. Incorporated in 2007, the Trust was established “to promote the documentation and preservation of significant examples of modernist architecture on the Outer Cape.” Now, if you’re thinking “modern” and “Cape Cod” go together about as well as sandcastles and an incoming tide, you’re not alone. Few people know that some of the great masters of modern architecture built houses on Cape Cod, even fewer know that these houses are now threatened, and that’s exactly what the Trust is trying to change.

One such house – located a short paddle away from Breuer’s house – was built in 1953 by Paul Weidlinger, an engineer who apprenticed with Le Corbusier. In designing his house, Weidlinger had input from Walter Gropius and Breuer, as well as from Corbu, who said, “Don’t pave the driveway.” Apparently, Corbu was confident that Weidlinger had a sturdy “machine for driving” to get him to the house, as the driveway is a narrow path that slaloms through the pine trees and abruptly rises and falls like waves on the sea. However, by forcing drivers to slow down, Weidlinger made it impossible to miss the transition into this landscape. The effect reminds me of the Zimmerman House by Frank Lloyd Wright, who controlled the flow through the open interior by varying the ceiling heights, rather than building walls.

The design – or lack of design – of Weidlinger’s driveway and his obvious appreciation for the natural setting are in keeping with the house, which is on stilts and barely impacts the landscape. This minimal impact is furthered by the fact that we can see through the stilts to the water, without a house blocking the view. Inside, the house centers on one large, open room with walls of glass that open onto a wrap-around balcony. The roof extends over this balcony, which speaks to a desire for indoor-outdoor living, as well as an engineer’s understanding of how an overhanging roof keeps a house cool in summertime.

In 2005 a falling tree damaged the roof, and since Weidlinger’s former wife gave away the house (note to self: Attend this woman’s next garage sale) to the National Seashore in the 1970s, it’s unclear where the funds for its repair will come from.

The rest of the houses the Trust is trying to save were not donated, but rather automatically reverted to government ownership under the 1961 terms that established the Seashore as a federally protected area. And I have to point out that the houses are not the only things at risk; we also stand to lose the stories. And you know there are stories. Just consider the players in this community: Breuer, Weidlinger, Gropius, Serge Chermayeff, Corbu phoning in from Paris (or perhaps he was in India then) and even the Saarinens, whose houseguests included Florence Knoll. In the quiet of Cape Cod, these architects and engineers found a place where they could play, work and collaborate.

The buildings they left behind (the Breuer and Saarinen houses are still family owned) are not going to be turned into museums by the Trust, but rather used for educational purposes, perhaps via a scholars-in-residence program. And this isn’t about studying the past. It’s about looking at how these designers’ ideas – about environmental impact, materials, scale and community living – can be applied and improved upon in the future.

While the next steps for the Weidlinger House aren’t clear, the Trust is about to begin restoration on the Kugel/Gips House, designed by Charlie Zehnder in 1970. Zehnder built more than 40 houses on Cape Cod, and I would show the Kugel/Gips to anyone who insists that modern architecture has to be sterile and cold. This is an inviting house, satisfying in its balance, use of materials and bold horizontal lines. How the sun sends shadows of trees curving across the structure is stunning and artful and makes me believe that there must be a worn path created by Zehnder’s footprints as he circled the house and planned how it would relate to the terrain.

The last house McMahon showed me was the Hatch House, designed by Jack Hall in 1960. As we come full circle in our story, something about this house reminds me of the cottage Thoreau built in 1845 on Walden Pond. The Hatch is a house that begs you to be quiet, perhaps so you can hear the ocean, or maybe because of how quietly it is perched on the dunes. This house knows it’s a visitor, and it’s a gracious one at that; if it were lost in a gale, the landscape would revert so quickly that it would be impossible to tell where the Hatch had been.

The Hatch House has historical status and is not in immediate danger of being razed, but without the necessary funding for its maintenance, this simple structure is at risk of disappearing into the dunes. There are still lessons to be learned from this house, which consists of three independent rectangular components, weathered to the color of driftwood. The sides of the house are on hinges, and when they’re lifted up and locked in place, they transform the outdoor deck into a covered area, protected from sun and rain. Behind these doors are walls of screen and the whole house becomes an open breezeway, not even impacting the salt air as it travels off the beach, through the house and into the dunes.

To make a donation to the Cape Cod Modern House Trust, or to learn more about their work, visit ccmht.org.

Click here to see more photos.

On campus with Mies, Corbu and Saarinen.

A student of modernism will recognize Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Le Corbusier and Eero Saarinen as designers of tables and chairs, but some may be surprised to recognize the work of these masters on American college campuses. In honor of the upcoming academic year, we’re looking at three buildings on the campuses of Illinois Institute of Technology, Harvard and MIT.

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was originally trained as a bricklayer before becoming a master of proportion in other materials, like steel and glass. It’s also ironic that Mies directed the College of Architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), as he had no formal architectural training of his own. Mies had a strict, meticulous approach and a belief in using only the finest materials. The precision with which he worked and the timeless architecture he created were the result of looking, studying and spending time with a problem until he was fully satisfied with an ordered and logical solution. Even after he mastered the principles that would forever define his work, Mies remained a student of materials and technology. “I don’t want to be interesting,” said Mies. “I want to be good.”

The S.R. Crown Hall, built in 1956, was the last of seven buildings Mies designed for the IIT campus in Chicago. In 2005, the S.R. Crown Hall underwent a $3.6 million restoration, kicked off when Mies’ grandson, Dirk Lohan, took a sledge hammer to one of the Hall’s windows. The privilege to do this to a National Historic Landmark was something Lohan won the right to in an eBay auction (he paid $2,705). The building houses IIT’s College of Architecture, which was directed by Mies for 20 years, ending in 1958, two years after his S.R. Crown Hall was built. Never one to add unnecessary ornament, the exterior of the rectangular building is made up of a steel frame with clear and frosted glass walls. The interior is an open, universal space, which Mies created so it could be adapted to meet changing needs. Visit the building when class is in session and you’ll find it filled with drafting tables at which students work by natural light coming through the 18-foot-high floor-to-ceiling windows.

While Mies created buildings that appeared almost to be floating, Le Corbusier built a “tight, dense world…where space seems almost carved out of tense volumes.”¹ Early in his career, Le Corbusier was apprenticed to Mies, and while the latter would go on to have a 30-year career in America, Corbu would not find the same success. In fact, there is only one building on the North American continent designed by Le Corbusier: the Carpenter Visual Arts Center at Harvard University. The building, which was completed in 1963, houses the Department of Visual and Environmental Studies. Shortly after breaking ground to build the Center, Corbu was awarded the 1961 gold medal from the American Institute of Architects (AIA). Upon accepting the medal, Corbu said, “I live in the skin of a student,” referring to his desire to find new ways to apply industrial design to built structures, which he called “machines for living.” An early teacher of Corbu’s, Charles L’Eplattenier, told him to “Learn every possible form of classic art – and forget it as quickly as possible in order to create something new.”

The Carpenter Center stands five stories tall, with a ramp through the building to encourage circulation and make visible the light-filled studios where students paint, draw and sculpt. Francesco Passanti, a Le Corbusier scholar, has compared the experience of walking by these studios to that of being on a train as it passes another train going the opposite direction. The fact that the Visual Arts Center does not blend in with the rest of Harvard’s brick and ivy-covered campus was intentional, as doing so would have been a contradiction. “Architecture,” said Corbu, “goes beyond utilitarian needs. You employ stone, wood and concrete, and with these materials you build houses and palaces. That is construction. Ingenuity is at work. But suddenly you touch my heart. You do me good and I am happy and I say, ‘This is beautiful.’ That is architecture. Art enters in.”

Le Corbusier was called “the Leonardo of our time” by Eero Saarinen, whose campus commissions included the Noyes dormitory at Vassar, the Kresge Auditorium and Chapel at MIT and the D’Angelo Law Library at the University of Chicago Law School. Barack Obama taught constitutional law at this school from 1992 to 2004, but he did not experience this building as it exists today, following a $32 million renovation completed in 2008. Saarinen’s concrete-framed six-story Law Library, with its “pleated” dark glass, was originally completed in 1959. The structure is devoid of the grey limestone, gargoyles and spires that are characteristic of the rest of the gothic campus, but it doesn’t conflict with them either. “Saarinen referred to his style as ‘neogothic,’” wrote critic Judith Russi Kirshner, “yet the very structure and materials – glass, steel and concrete – exemplified a contemporary aesthetic objective and philosophical idea of clarity.”

Saarinen’s design called for open areas that encouraged discussion, and the recent renovation has stayed true to that goal, while adding the best tools of the digital age to the collaborative, inviting work space. Unlike Corbu and Mies, who created open flexible areas that could change with use, Saarinen created the Law Library for the University of Chicago law students, and not for anything else. “The overall concept seeks to reflect the importance to the legal profession,” said Saarinen, “of both the written and the spoken word.”

The D’Angelo Law Library is not open to the public. For access to the Carpenter Center and S.R. Crown Hall, check with Harvard and IIT, respectively.
 

1. The New York Times, “Architecture: Mies at National Gallery,” October 20, 1979.