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| Essential Architecture- Search by style Chicago school (architecture) | ||
| During the 1880's and '90s, Chicago architects designed buildings with exteriors clearly expressing their innovative steel-frame construction. These "Chicago School" buildings have been praised as important precursors to 20th-century steel-and-glass skyscrapers. In Chicago, most examples of the style are office buildings in the Loop. Common characteristics are: -steel-frame construction -masonry cladding, usually terra cotta, clearly emphasizing the steel framing -distinctive three-part windows, with large central fixed panes flanked by smaller double-hung sash windows -minimal use of ornament | ||
Chicago architecture is famous throughout the world and one style is referred to as the Chicago School. In the history of architecture, the Chicago School was a school of architects active in Chicago at the turn of the 20th century. They were among the first to promote the new technologies of steel-frame construction in commercial buildings, and developed a spatial aesthetic which co-evolved with, and then came to influence, parallel developments in European Modernism.  Chicago School window grid Some of the distinguishing features of the Chicago School are the use of steel-frame buildings with masonry cladding (usually terra cotta), allowing large window areas and the use of limited amounts of exterior ornament. Sometimes elements of neoclassical architecture are used in Chicago School skyscrapers. If taken as a whole, Chicago School skyscrapers contain the three parts of a classical column. The first floor functions as the base, the middle stories, usually with little ornamental detail, act as the shaft of the column, and the last floor or so represent the capital, with more ornamental detail and capped with a cornice. The "Chicago window" originated in this school. It is a three-part window consisting of a large fixed center panel flanked by two smaller double-hung sash windows. The arrangement of windows on the facade typically creates a grid pattern, with some projecting out from the facade forming bay windows. Architects whose names are associated with the Chicago School include Dankmar Adler, Daniel Burnham, William Holabird, William LeBaron Jenney, Martin Roche, John Root, and Louis Sullivan. Frank Lloyd Wright started in the firm of Adler and Sullivan but created his own Prairie Style of architecture. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who had run Bauhaus in Germany before coming to Chicago, is sometimes credited with creating a second Chicago school.  Louis Sullivan's Carson, Pirie, Scott & Co. Building The Home Insurance Building, which some regarded as the first skyscraper in the world, was built in Chicago in 1885 and was demolished in 1931. Some of the more famous Chicago School buildings in Chicago include: Auditorium Building Carson, Pirie, Scott and Company Building Reliance Building Gage Group Buildings Chicago Building Brooks Building Heyworth Building Leiter I Building Leiter II Building Marquette Building Monadnock Building Montauk Building Today, you will discover different styles of architecture all throughout the city, such as the Chicago School, neo-classical, art deco, modern, and postmodern. | ||