1967, 1974 and 2010

Whenever the Roberts Tower on Eighth Street downtown is completed, it will have been a long time since any new residential buildings have been built downtown. There is no need to state the obvious, that no tall residential buildings have been built, because there have simply been none. The last new residential building to be built downtown was any one of the three towers of the Mansion House Center on Fourth Street, completed in 1967. Over forty years later, we await the next installment in the very limited and erratic story of downtown apartment building construction. (Our last tall building, the maligned Thomas Eagleton Federal Courthouse, arrived in 1997.)

The Roberts Tower's architects are unheralded, and I cannot draw any name when asked who she or he is, or who they are. All I know is that the design is a suitable modern building, disgraced only slightly by the oh-too-silvery reflective glass being used to clad it. While I appreciate the break from the minimalist humdrum that inhibits contemporary architects, I am not impressed with the awkward reference to 1980s postmodern glazing trends. I'll admit that the greenish reflective glass shown in early renderings of the Roberts Tower would have been no better. At least views of the rear elevation of the Old Post Office will be enshrined in the wall as well as -- unfortunately, for the most part -- any elements of Old Post Office Plaza that catch the mirrored surface.


On the matter of Old Post Office Plaza, there is no denying that the block is playing out very much like the vision shown in the 1974 Downtown Plan produced by PGAV for the Downtown Partnership. While we did not get the sunken plaza shown in the rendering, we did get a plaza and a narrow concrete tower in line with the south elevation of the Orpheum Theater. Alas, the 1974 plaza looks to be far more humane than what was built. Hopefully the Roberts Tower outshines the tepid hulk envisioned by planners back in the day. Architecture, supposedly the realm of innovation, is more often the repetition of concepts through new expression. That is, it may have been 1967 when downtown's last high-rise residential building was completed, but forty-three years later have seem to have progressed to 1974. That's not terrible -- Mansion House is still lovely despite some recent muddling.

An Update on the Louis Sullivan Film

Two years ago, Mark Richard Smith began filming Louis Sullivan: The Struggle for American Architecture. He visited St. Louis that year, shooting in the city at and Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville, and I spent some time with him talking about the Union Trust Building.

Mark is a remarkably driven first-time filmmaker who spent twenty years as a graphic designer before switching paths. Wanting to make films that visualize history, Mark enrolled in the graduate history program at Loyola University Chicago. In Chicago, Mark saw the photographs of Richard Nickel and their poetic grace drew him to the subject matter of his first film.

Last year, Mark posted a trailer on YouTube.




Then, one month ago, an unfinished scene about the Trading Room of Sullivan's Chicago Stock Exchange.

The Design Competition's Jury, and Its Grand Jury

This morning, the CityArchRiver 2015 Foundation announced the jury that ultimately will select the winning entry in the International Gateway Arch Design Competition. The eight jurors are:

Robert Campbell, architecture critic at The Boston Globe and contributing editor for Architectural Record;

Gerald Early, Merle Kling Professor of Modern Letters and Director of the African and Afro-American Studies at Washington University in St. Louis;

Denis P. Galvin, former Deputy Director of the National Park Service;

Alex Krieger, founding principal of Chan Krieger Sieniewicz, architecture and urban design firm and professor at the Harvard School of Design, Cambridge, Mass.;

David C. Leland, an urban strategist and managing director of the Leland Consulting Group, Portland, Ore.;

Cara McCarty, curator of the Smithsonian's Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum, New York City;

Laurie D. Olin, partner and landscape architect of the OLIN Studio, Philadelphia;

Carol Ross Barney, founder and Principal of Ross Barney Architects, Chicago.

Notably, there is only one St. Louis resident on the panel, Gerald Early. However, the fact that the local juror is a scholar of cultural history and not someone deeply tied to the local architectural community is refreshing. Cara McCarty is also a scholar with a local connection; she used to serve as a curator at the St. Louis Art Museum.

Some wonder why there is not more local representation on the jury, and that is a valid question. Certainly there are local architectural critics, professors of architectural history, architects and designers whose credentials match or trump those found in this jury. There has been rumbling from local architects that the program requirements for the competition is out of reach for local firms, and jury spots could have provided consolation.

However, the jury would not do well for St. Louis if it were fraught with the politics of representing local talent or special interests. The jury must be able to independently evaluate the submissions free from the wires of local politics. That goal has been accomplished. We now will have a rare opportunity to watch architectural heavyweights from other places examine St. Louis, which should be a welcome breath of fresh air.

The jury's composition, however, should not consign local critics to passivity. In fact, having St. Louis' leading critics and designers outside of the official process allows them the free reign of critical engagement that only those with deep local understanding can offer. All of us concerned with the competition should step up to demand excellence, praise good decisions, call out bad decisions and work to guarantee that the design competition is truly a great moment for our city.

The decision to have a competition, after all, is political. Politics can water down great ideas. The ambitious deadline for completing the winning design is a political threat to realizing a transformative change in connections between downtown and the riverfront. The jury can't tackle that problem -- that's up to the rest of us. Citizens remain the grand jury.

Yamasaki, Inc. Closes

The Detroit Free Press reports that Yamasaki, Inc. has closed. This is the end of one of modern architecture's most illustrious American firms. Founded by Minoru Yamasaki in 1959, the firm's name is found on the drawings for the ill-fated World Trade Center as well as many significant modernist designs.

The firm marked the departure of Yamasaki from the Detroit-based firm Hellmuth, Yamasaki & Leinweber, which Yamasaki had founded in 1949 with St. Louisan George Hellmuth and Joseph Leinweber. The three had worked together at Detroit firm Smith Hinchman & Grylls. Hellmuth, Yamasaki & Leinweber left a tremendous impact in St. Louis, designing the terminal at Lambert Airport (1956) and most of the St. Louis Housing Authority's projects from the early postwar era, including the Pruitt-Igoe project (1954). When the firm split, Hellmuth created the firm Hellmuth Obata Kassabaum in St. Louis, which went on to become the world's largest architectural firm and continues to be a giant among American firms.

W. Philip Cotton, Jr. (1932-2009)

Today's passing of W. Philip Cotton, Jr. marks the end of an era. Phil -- born in Columbia, Missouri as William Philip Cotton, Jr. -- was one of St. Louis' early preservation pioneers. An architect by training, Phil became a tireless advocate for historic architecture out of the necessity of his times. After graduating from Princeton in 1954, Phil moved back to St. Louis in time for the urban renewal years.

In 1966, Phil wrote the National Historic Landmark nomination for the Wainwright Building. He also was active in efforts to get Lafayette Square designated as a Historic District in the National register of Historic Places. The 1969 listing of the Square helped prevent plans for a highway that would have destroyed the eastern end of the neighborhood. In this time, Phil was also an outspoken advocate for the reform of city tax laws that rewarded owner inaction in maintenance and discouraged investment.

In 1969, Phil was part of a group of architects, historians and planners that created Heritage/St. Louis. Heritage/St. Louis is one of the early advocates' greatest gifts to future preservationists: a citywide architectural survey conducted by volunteers between 1969 and 1976. Although documentation was simply a photograph, address and short assessment of buildings, the survey allowed for thousands of buildings to be documented -- many for the last time. Heritage/St. Louis' inventory of images from north St. Louis grows valuable every day. Sponsored by the Landmarks Association of St. Louis (on whose board Phil once served) and the City Plan Commission, Heritage St. Louis' daily operations were oversaw by Executive Director Cotton.

The aim of the project, a 500-page book on the city's architecture to be published in the bicentennial year, was never realized. However, the survey sheets -- now in the archives of Landmarks Association -- are a civic treasure. Alongside this work, Phil also saw that architectural drawings for many major St. Louis buildings were microfilmed. One of Phil's greatest contributions to preservation was his understanding of the value of thorough documentation.

Alongside this work in the city, Phil also was active in the county (producing the survey 100 Historic Buildings in St. Louis County in 1970) and the state of Missouri. In the mid 1970s, Phil Cotton drafted the outline of the statewide preservation organization later to become Missouri Preservation. He remain a counselor to that organization until his death.

Phil also championed the city's official landmark program, and nominated the first 35 sites, structures and buildings to receive that designation. The city landmark program granted more than symbolic value or financial aid for preservation, but legal safeguards. Knowing Phil, I am not surprised that he sought the highest protection for the landmarks he valued the most.

Of course, throughout his service to the city and state as an advocate, Phil was an active preservation architect. Among his many restoration projects are the Piper Palm House in Tower Grove Park, the Mark Twain boyhood home in Hannibal, Missouri, the Collins House in Collinsville, Illinois, the Gittemeier House in Florissant, the Saline County Courthouse in Missouri and others. Not surprising, also, that Phil Cotton was an organist and aficionado of classical music whose knowledge was revered by his friends. Phil's interest in architecture seemed to stem from a larger concern about the legacy of culture we all share and must steward.

In recent years, Phil remained as persistent as ever -- even in the face of illness. He continued his service as a trustee of the Steedman Architectural Library of the St. Louis Public Library. He was named to the College of Fellows of the American Institute of Architects in 2002. When I first met Phil a few years ago, he was hard at work on editing a reprint of John Albury Bryan's Lafayette Square, published in 2007. Dogged and principled, opinionated and generous, articulate and fastidious, Phil Cotton left us a legacy to admire and emulate.

(A copy of Phil's 1978 essay "Architectural Space of St. Louis" is online here.)

Never Built: Million-Dollar Hotel

This rendering for a "$1,000,000 Hotel" at the corner of Maryland and Kingshighway appeared in the Realty Record and Builder in 1906. The architect was Isaac Taylor, whose already-wide renown grew even wider after his stint as Director of Works for the World's Fair. The design is noteworthy for its exotic classicism, seen especially in the central dome crowning the enormous building.

Never built, the site is today occupied by Straub's grocery store. An even larger hotel, the Park Plaza, would be built by 1929 across Maryland.

Lost: St. Ann's Orphan Asylum

St. Ann's Orphan Asylum stood at the northwest corner of Page and Union from 1904 until the late 1970s, when it was demolished. Operated by the Roman Catholic Church, the asylum relocated to the city's west end from a downtown location at 10th and O'Fallon streets. The building permit dates to June 22, 1904 and lists a construction cost of $200,000 and the architects as Barnett, Haynes and Barnett.

The high cost went for high quality. The 3 1/2 story asylum was large, and its Elizabethan Gothic architecture was elegant. The building featured an expansive lawn on four sides, affording the orphans with grounds for recreation surpassing the modest court at the downtown location. Here we see the late Victorian ideals -- lovely architecture masking a function of social utility as well as a belief in the social and health benefits of planned open space. The asylum rose as the World's Fair was taking place not far to the south in Forest Park. The fair reinforced the faith in planned open spaces and architectural grandeur found in the asylum. Coincidentally, the architects of the orphan's asylum also designed the Palace of Liberal Arts at the fair.

In 1904, Barnett, Haynes and Barnett was one of the city's best-known and most revered firms. The firm's principals were George D. Barnett, John Haynes and Thomas P. Barnett, and together the men had already designed many homes and commercial buildings in the thriving west end. The firm also enjoyed a good relationship with the Archdiocese, an had designed the romantic Visitation Convent (1894, demolished) located at Belt and Cabanne in the West End, Sacred Heart Church (1898, demolished) at 25th and University in St. Louis Place, and the Scholastic Building at St. Louis University (1896). On Page Boulevard alone, the firm was responsible for designing St. Ann's Church at Whittier and Page (1897) and St. Mark's at Page and Academy (1901). The pinnacle of the working relationship would be the firm's design of the great Cathedral Basilica on Lindell Boulevard. The firm's institutional work shows a tendency toward the romantic, with picturesque buildings placed on landscaped lawns, and St. Ann's Orphan Asylum fits in that range. Stylistically, however, the Elizabethan Gothic is unique for a large institutional building by the firm but parallel to the contenporary work of school architect William B. Ittner.

The asylum eventually became a retirement home before being demolished by the Archdiocese. The site today is occupied by the Annie Malone Children and Family Service Center and the Peace Villa, which maintain to some extent the site's devotion to social service. The eastern end of the site is used by a grocery store.

(Postcard courtesy of the St. Louis Building Arts Foundation Library.)

Odds and Ends

MCPHEETERS WAREHOUSES NEARLY GONE: The McPheeters Warehouses on Leonor K. Sullivan Boulevard, subject of a Vital Voice column of mine published in June, are nearly gone. Demolition started two weeks ago, and now the one-story cold storage warehouse and most of the center building are gone.

SHANK SONS HONOR ISADORE: Peter and Stephen Shank have published Firbeams, a lovely website featuring the residential architecture of father Isadore Shank.

KIEL PROGRESS: In the St. Louis Beacon, Charlene Prost reports on progress in the plan by SCP Worldwide and McEagle Properties to re-open the Kiel Opera House.

VACANT BUILDING INITIATIVE: As featured in a story on KSDK TV this week, Alderman Kacie Starr Triplett (D-6th) has introduced Board Bill 174, which would require owners of vacant buildings to pay an annual registration fee, carry liability insurance and secure all openings, among other requirements. Church and nonprofit property is exempt, but Land Reutilization Authority property is not. More later.

STATEWIDE PRESERVATION CONFERENCE SEPTEMBER 10-13 IN ST. CHARLES: The 2008 Annual Statewide Preservation Conference begins on Wednesday, September 10 in St. Charles. I am co-presenting a workshop with Jan Cameron of the St. Louis Cultural Resources Office entitled "Vernacular Architecture from the Stone Age to the Space Age." Details here.

DRURY WANTS TO DO WHAT?: At Vanishing STL, Paul Hohmann reports on a bizarre plan by Drury Hotels to demolish the northwest corner of the Forest Park Southeast neighborhood for a new hotel. The plan threatens the Lambskin Temple and many historic homes. Drury will present the plans tonight at the Gibson Heights Neighborhood Association meeting, 7:00 p.m. at 1034 S. Kingshighway.

Springfield's Park Central Square Contested

The Springfield News-Leader reports on the issues surrounding Park Central Square in downtown Springfield, Missouri. Supposedly designed by famed landscape architect Lawrence Halprin but remodeled in the the years since its 1969 construction, the park is at the center of a dispute between city government, which wants to redesign the park, and preservationists who want to restore the original design. The original design, however, is also contested -- some claim Halprin was not the architect of the plan that actually was built.

Because the city is using federal funding for their redesign, a section 106 review has been triggered. Section 106 reviews, mandated by the 1966 federal Historic Preservation Act, are administered by the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) and serve the purpose of determining whether sites impacted by federal spending are eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places. SHPO's ruling here could determine what the park will end up looking like. If SHPO determines the park is eligible for listing, and advocates for its preservation can get it listed on the National Register, the city's plans could be derailed.

Preservation Board Meets Tomorrow to Consider Modern Houses on Westminster, Other Items

The city's Preservation Board meets tomorrow. The agenda is available with full reports. The agenda features the usual preliminary review of new construction in historic districts, another case of vinyl windows being installed without a permit and several nominations to the National Register of Historic Places (including two on which I am coauthor with Carolyn Toft). There are no demolition permits on this month's agenda.

Perhaps the most interesting agenda item concerns 4257 and 4263 Westminster in the Central West End, where architect and Preservation Board member Anthony Robinson seeks to build two very modern houses.

The meeting begins at 4:00 p.m. in the offices of the Planning and Urban Design Agency, 1015 Locust Street on the 12th floor.

MayorSlay Talks with John Burse

MayorSlay.com's latest podcast subject is my neighbor, architect John Burse. In his interview, John shares thoughts about the uniqueness of Old North St. Louis, what makes neighborhoods unique (and what makes others contrived), revitalizing the Gateway Mall and other things.

Listen here.

Harris Armstrong Lives On

Instead of sitting at my desk working through lunch on Friday, at the urging of two friends I headed to Webster University to catch architect Andrew Raimist's slide lecture on Harris Armstrong. While I knew a fair amount about Armstrong before Friday, most of it was through facts gleaned from books and Raimist's own writing.

Armstrong's various work spread across the mid-century make so much more sense when explained by Raimist, who has a wonderful mix of true insight and eager passion for his subject. Raimist's narration against the backdrop of beautiful images projected screen-size make for a compelling hour and for a much more vivid examination of Harris Armstrong than can be found in any other way.

Thankfully, Raimist has published a large amount of his research on Armstrong and an equally vast amount of images. While this is more linear offering than the lecture, these are formidable resources in their own right. After all, few St. Louis architects have bona fide biographers, let alone anyone as intense as Andrew Raimist.

Please visit his websites:

Architectural Ruminations (blog)

Raimist's Flickr page (photos)

The Presence of Taylor and Enders

Stand at the corner of Eleventh and Washington streets in downtown St. Louis, and face north. On your right, across a parking lot, is the Catlin-Morton Building, built in 1901. Ahead, across another parking lot, is the Hadley-Dean Building, built in 1903. To your right, at the northeast corner, is the Bee Hat Company Building, built in 1899. On your immediate right is the robust Merchandise Mart Building (originally the Liggett and Myers Building), built in 1888-9.

As you scan these buildings, you will notice similarities: heights around seven stories tall, deft articulation of the masonry walls of the buildings, repeated arches, Classical Revival ornament balanced with modern forms. The bearing-wall Merchandise Mart has to be the finest Romanesque Revival building downtown, and the Hadley-Dean's austerity anticipates the arrival of modernism in St. Louis.

However, these buildings share something more fundamental: the same architect, or perhaps architects. These buildings were designed by the prolific Isaac Taylor and his chief draftsman, Oscar Enders.

In a downtown marked by demolition, it seems rather fortuitous to the legacy of Taylor and Enders that their buildings remain such a strong presence. On the 1000 block of Washington, the Merchandise Mart occupied the entire southern side of the block while the north side, including the later Dorsa Building, is book-ended by Taylor and Enders' designs of the Bee Hat Company Building and the Sullivan (alter Curlee) Building at Tenth and Washington, built in 1899.

Of course, other Taylor and Enders works have not been so blessed; the Columbia Buidling at Eighth and Locust was cut down to two stories in 1977, and the Silk Exchange Building at the southwest corner of Tucker and Washington burned and was demolished in 1995.

Statement on Government Hill

At a special meeting on July 31, 2006, the Preservation Board of the City of St. Louis considered preliminary approval of a redesign of Government Hill in Forest Park. The Board unanimously approved a revised proposal submitted by Forest Park Forever. I submitted this statement.

I want to offer some comments about the Government Hill proposal being considered by the Preservation Board today.

On June 30, after the Preservation Board decided to defer consideration on preliminary approval a radical revision of Government Hill, Mayor Slay wrote in his blog that "there's time" for more consideration and public input on the redesign.

When the Preservation Board agenda for the July meeting was released, myself and others were relieved that Government Hill was not on the agenda. It seemed that Forest Park Forever had heeded the call of the Preservation Board and the Mayor to give such a major proposal regarding a much-loved landscape ample time for revision and comment.

Then, last night when I read the mayor's campaign website, I saw a notice that there would be a special Preservation Board meeting today at 4:30 p.m. to consider the matter of a revised proposal from Forest Park Forever and others for revisions to Government Hill. While there may have been some warning elsewhere, it was the first I had heard of the meeting and I had less than 24 hours to review the plans and provide commentary.

Earlier, I had assumed that myself and others concerned about the matter -- including members of the Board -- could study the issue and provide measured testimony at a future hearing. Apparently, that will not happen. I am disappointed in this hasty process, and disappointed that I cannot attend today's meeting due to previously-scheduled appointments. Had I know sooner, even on a week's notice, I would have made plans to attend the meeting.

As it is, I can barely offer commentary on the new proposal based on the abstract plans contained in the report of the staff of the Cultural Resources Office. The plan seems to be more respectful of the original design, but since no renderings are enclosed it is nearly impossible to tell.

The existing landscape, designed by noted local landscape architect George Kessler around 1911, is a stunning example of the "City Beautiful" era of Beaux-Arts formalism. Some of the landscape designs from that period have not held up well as gathering places, due to aesthetic programs that look better than they function. Not so with Kessler's Government Hill design, which seems to get more popular as time goes by. His grand staircases, central fountain and terraces amid sloping hills create an inviting context with a scale that is respectful of both the World's Fair Pavilion and the users of Forest Park.

The only flaws in this landscape are the lack of universal accessibility and the lack of maintenance. The new proposal seems to take a good step in addressing accessibility without intruding on the existing landscape. The plan unveiled in June was little more than a giant zigzag ramp, based on intriguing medieval designs but totally inappropriate for the site. In terms of restoration, it seems that the new plan is more sensitive to the Kessler design but still aiming to remake it according to modern designs.

That's where the first plan for rebuilding Government Hill is better; if something new is going to happen, it should be complementary to the landscape of the park and a compelling and original design in itself. The proposal being considered today is not compelling or original, but the Kessler design even in its decay remains so.

I urge the Preservation Board to deny preliminary approval, and to urge Forest Park Forever to consider funding the restoration project that the wonderful Government Hill landscape deserves. If they seek a grand gesture or some other imprint on the park, they need not worry. Their restoration work to date has been one of the grandest civic gestures in recent history, and a sensitive restoration of Government Hill would be an excellent capstone.

Considering Wright

In "A Case Against Frank Lloyd Wright: Architect", Toby Weiss makes a brilliant entry into the ongoing debate on the historical importance of architect Frank Lloyd Wright. The essay spends a lot of time investigating the reconstruction work needed to keep his landmark works watertight and structurally sound.

Toby's points resonate with me to great extent. While I remain fascinated with the aesthetic dimension of architecture, I am most impressed with what buildings are and how they function. May favorite buildings balance technical proficiency with inspired design, and their architects never lost sight of the fundamental basis of architecture: containment of space for a purpose. Wright's mentor and one of my favorite architects, Louis Sullivan, applied rigorous standards to the construction of his buildings because he believed that the appearance of the building should be the embodiment of the architectural form he was designing. While Sullivan is best remembered for his artistic achievements, part of his architectural program was structural innovation and his partnership with structural genius Dankmar Adler shows his desire to get every detail correct.

In contrast, Wright's iconoclastic insistence on advancing design principles ahead of examination of what his buildings were seems sloppy and careless. However, Wright created wonderful works of architecture and a few, such as Chicago's Robie House and Springfield's Dana-Thomas House, that lack the structural pitfalls of his later work. There seems to be a point in his career at which he began to willfully avoid the pragmatics needed to make truly great buildings. While his earlier works show that he learned from Sullivan the importance of posing the building as a solution to a spatial problem, his later works are almost purely artistic creations that nonetheless make great, awe-inspiring spaces. That he would come to insist upon bizarre and faulty construction methods is troubling, but more suggestive of the consumption of Wright by his ego and "vision" than of his inadequacy as an architect. Wright could do better, and chose not to do so.

I would say such a choice is not the mark of an artist, but of an architect acting irresponsibly toward his buildings. If the architect has a duty to any one thing, it is to the buildings that he creates. If a lapse in duty is a failing, then Wright failed in the late part of his career. Oddly, he is much more revered than Sullivan, whose duty to architecture was so intense that he sacrificed his career rather than make bad buildings. (Both were, however, similarly arrogant toward clients and moody.) Sullivan could be a bully, but he did not lose clients because his roofs leaked and he denied the problem. He lost clients because his theory of architecture was supplanted by others, and his vision was too strong to be tolerable to most clients. He did not want to balance his views and those of his client. Neither did Wright, who also had long stretches without much work.

So why did Wright become an enduring popular legend and Sullivan largely forgotten until the scholars began reconstructing his legacy in the late 1950s? Mass media seemed to play a role; Wright's sensational personal life and aptitude at developing quotable axioms made him great fodder for newspaper articles, radio news programs and, famously, television. To some degree, Wright was able to compromise his presentation with public expectations; Sullivan was far too verbose and serious to do so.

Wright's legacy as an architect alone would not have solidified his fame; his ability to become the first American architectural media icon did so. As a showman, he excelled. He defined the public's perception of the Architect in a way that Sullivan could not. Whether or not his buildings need expensive repairs based on his faulty structural calculations to most admirers seems but a footnote to his body of work as public figure and designer. Perhaps the trouble with Wright is that it's nearly impossible to consider his work apart from his role as a public figure.

To me, each aspect is equally important. I admire Wright but find
Sullivan, H.H. Richardson, Albert Kahn, George Elmslie and much lesser-known American architects to be far more studious designers committed to great, functional buildings before being committed to theoretical purity. Ironically, other architects achieved a consistency greater than Wright's without making big promises. The legacy of 20th century American architecture was enriched by Wright and defined by others.