Sarah Buys & Sells
  • Real Estate
  • Client Reviews
  • Real Estate & History Blog
  • Architectural Photography
  • Website Design
  • Video Design
  • Contact

Real Estate
&
History Blog

Let's Go To Architecture School - Lesson #4

11/8/2015

0 Comments

 
Do you know who this is?
Picture
Nope - not Mayor Daley.   Nope - not Ike Sewell, founder of Uno's Pizza.  This is architect Mies van der Rohe.

Disclosure - for no real logical reason I once had a dream where I was an architect working on a job site of his and I had an entire discussion with him in German.  Weird, I know!

From the Chicago Architecture Foundation's website:

"It’s difficult to imagine what the skyline of Chicago might look like without architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. He influenced an entire generation of architects while tenured as head of the architecture department at the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). During his 60-year career Mies established a design vocabulary that helped define Mid-Century Modern architecture.
Mies did not design buildings with a particular style in mind. For him, the philosophy came first. How a building looked was purely an expression of its time and materials. He explained, “I am not interested in the history of civilization. I am interested in our civilization. We are living it. Because I really believe, after a long time of working and thinking and studying that architecture … can only express this civilization we are in and nothing else.”
When Mies arrived in the United States in 1938, he was already internationally known and established in his field. He designed one of his most famous buildings — the Barcelona Pavilion — as the German Pavilion for the 1929 International Exposition in Spain. It’s a magnificent example of his trademark emphasis on open space. Soon after that success he served as director of the Bauhaus, the school of design in Germany. He elected to close the school in 1933 and eventually left his home country due to mounting pressure from the growing Nazi regime.
From 1939-58 he served as head of the architecture department of IIT where he not only redesigned the department’s curriculum but also the university’s campus. A year after his appointment he developed plans for the recently expanded 120-acre campus. Mies designed a collection of buildings with steel and concrete frames wrapped in brick and glass curtain walls, including his masterpiece: Crown Hall. The campus was revolutionary at the time and perfectly expressed Mies’ design principles and “less is more” approach.  
In 1960 he was awarded the AIA Gold Medal, which is the highest award given by the American Association of Architects. Considered among the greatest architects of the 20th century, Mies’ influence can be seen throughout Chicago and certainly reaches far beyond his adopted hometown."
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Archives

    February 2024
    August 2023
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    January 2021
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    September 2017
    August 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    December 2016
    October 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014

    Categories

    All
    Evanston
    Glencoe
    Highland-park
    Kenilworth
    Lake Bluff
    Lake Forest
    Morton Grove
    Skokie
    Wilmette
    Winnetka

    Author

    Sarah Rothschild, Realtor & Architectural History Nerd.

    RSS Feed

Picture
Sarah Rothschild reviews
Picture
Picture
[email protected]
847/361.9057
© 2025   Sarah J Rothschild
Photo from Danijel J
  • Real Estate
  • Client Reviews
  • Real Estate & History Blog
  • Architectural Photography
  • Website Design
  • Video Design
  • Contact