Architecture in Colonial and Post-Colonial America

CLINT JUN A. MATURAN BS-ARCHITECTURE II

Colonial and Pre - Colonial American Architecture Pre - Columbian or Pre - Colonial American architecture consists mainly of Mesoamerican architecture and Incan architecture. The architectural character of this period varies from region to region this was due to the exchange of cultures all throughout the period. It was constantly evolving and changing since this was a span of at least a thousand years. American Colonial Architecture is not necessarily one period but it is named as such to summarize all sub periods under it. Since there were several design types that were developed during this period and those period were named after the colonizers. These periods were the French Colonial, Spanish, Georgian, Dutch, Saltbox, Cape Cod, Southern, New England, Garrison, Federal also there the New Colonial styles which are the Colonial Revival and Neo - Colonial.

Each of these sub periods have their own architectural character: 1. French Colonial homes have stucco-sided homes with expansive twostory porches and narrow wooden pillars tucked under the roof line. The porch was an important passageway because traditional French Colonial homes did not have interior halls.

2. Spanish Colonial were most commonly sided in adobe or stucco. The roofs were flat or slightly pitched and finished with red clay tiles. Some Spanish Colonial homes featured a Monterey-style, second-story porch.

3. Georgian Colonists built sophisticated brick and clapboard homes that imitated British architectural fashion. Georgian Colonial homes were highly symmetrical with multi-pane windows evenly balanced on each side of a central front door. This faade was modestly ornamented with dentil moldings or decorative flat pilasters.

4. Garrison Colonial homes imitated the houses of medieval England. Many of these homes had steep gabled roofs, small diamond paned windows, and a second story overhang across the front facade. Garrison Colonials usually were sided in unpainted clapboard or wood shingles.

5. New England Colonial homes were two stories high with gables on the side and an entry door at the center. To conserve heat, a massive chimney ran through the center and sidings were not painted.

6. Southern colonial homes were symmetrical in shape. The siding, however, was often brick and the chimneys were placed at the sides instead of in the center.

7. Cape Cod colonial houses had one-story or one-and-a-half stories with no dormers. They usually were sided with shingles or unpainted clapboards.

8. Dutch Colonists often built brick or stone homes with roofs that reflected their Flemish culture. Sometimes the eaves were flared and sometimes the roofs were slightly rounded into barn-like gambrel shapes.

9. Colonial Revival Style is as is a revival of the Colonial styles while Neo Colonial was like mash up of the Colonial Styles but with improvements

Influences
The study of the progress of architecture in new country, untrammeled with precedent and lacking the conditions obtaining in Europe, is interesting; but room is not available for more than cursory glance. During the eighteenth century (1725-1775) buildings were erected which have been termed colonial in style, corresponding to what is understood in England as Queen Anne or Georgian. In the New England States wood was the material principally employed, and largely affected the detail. Craigie House, Cambridge (1757), is typical of the symmetrical buildings. It has elongated Ionic half-columns to its faade, shuttered sash windows the hipped roof and the dentil cornice of the Queen Anne period; the internal fittings resembling those of Adam and Sheraton. Economically and Socially the most advanced nation of the continent was the U.S.A., where a sense of national identity had been reinforced by the war with Britain of 1812-14. By 1840 the countrys trade was worth 250 million dollars per year, almost half being earned by New York. Cotton of Louisana and extensive coal and iron resources of Pennsylvania.

Influences

The presidency of Andre Jackson gave impetus to wider democratic ideals and greatly encouraged individual enterprise. The westward movement being dramatically accelerated by the discovery of gold in California in 1848.

Andrew Jackson was the seventh President of the United States.

Influences
The coming to power in 1861 of an anti-slavery government under Abraham Lincoln (1809-65) brought to a head the rivalry between the more dynamic Northern States and cotton producing Southern States, with their longestablished plantation system based on slavery, and kindled the tragic civil war (1861-65), during the course of which, in 1863, slavery was abolished. The victory of the Northern States, and of the union, was decisive for the future of the country and encourage industrial development, which in turn greatly increased the rate of immigration generally, the period following the civil war was one of continuing commercial expansion, an age offering great opportunities and high material rewards to individual industrialist, bankers, farmers, and railway owners. This situation, clearly reflected in the architecture of the time, continued until the financial crash of 1929 and ensuing depression. The opening up of the country by railways was essential to development, and the continent was finally transverse by rail from coast to coast in 1869. Alexander Graham Bells invention of the telephone in 1876 further facilitated communications across the vast country which, in 1865, had been linked to Europe by trans-Atlantic cable. Finally the mass production of the motor car between the two world wars further extended communications and movement.

Influences
As far as industry is concerned, Canadas development was much less rapid, her economy being based almost entirely on the export of lumber and wheat. Like Canada, the countries of South America relied on the export of natural products rather than on manufacturing, and opening of the Panama Canal in 1914 was great significance in the development of the countries of the Pacific Coast.

Character
European influence in both North and South America remained strong throughout the period, although materials, local skills, social customs and especially climatic conditions played their part, and buildings continued to posses strong regional characteristics. In the U.S.A. itself, a conscious striving for a truly national architecture became evident soon after the war of independence, and architecture in that country can be considered as passing through three broad and loosely phases: a.) Post-Colonial b.) First Eclectic Phase c.) Second Eclectic Phase

Character
a.)Post-Colonial (1790-1820) Architecture of this period moved away from the English Georgian idiom which had become established along the eastern seaboard of the country Neoclassic elements were introduced. b.) First Eclectic Phase (1820-1869) During this period the revived Greek style was predominant receiving a more whole-hearted acceptance that it did in England and developing specifically American characteristics. The Gothic and Egyptian styles found some popularity but compared with the Greek revival, these were minor streams. The type of timber framing known as the baloon frame came into use during this period and revolutionized timber construction. As its name suggest, rather than relying on an essentially post-and-lintel construction, the baloonframe owes its strength to the walls, roofs, etc., acting as diaphragms. Comparatively light timber sections are employed which are nailed together, floor, and ceiling joist, forming ties, the whole stiffened by the external timber sheathing.

Character

This period saw considerable developments in the use of cast-iron as a building material.

Character
c. ) Second Eclectic Phase (1860-1930) American architecture achieved international significance during this period and followed two main streams. The first related to the Gothic revival and initiated as a Romanesque revival with H.H. Richardson as its first important exponent, gained considerable momentum and reached great vigor and vitality in the work of Louis Sullivan. In some respects the movement in its later stages can be equated with that of the arts and crafts in Britain and it culminated in the work of Frank Lloyd Wright. The second stream was more academic in character. Influence by the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris its architecture inspired by the great periods of the past, the Italian and French Renaissance, ancient Greek and Roman and late Gothic.

Character
Two important and influential exhibitions belongs to this period; the centennial expositions 1876, Philadelphia and the worlds Columbian exposition (Chicago 1893). The period is noteworthy for structural experiment and achievement. The Skyscraper, often regarded as Americas greatest single contribution to architectural development, was a product of this phase and was closely related to metal frame construction the nonload-bearing curtain wall and the lift or elevator. The period saw also the establishment of many schools of architecture in the U.S.A., the first at Massachusetts Institutes of Technology in 1868, under W.R. Ware.

EXAMPLES
A. DOMESTIC BUILDINGS

1. The WHITE HOUSE, Washington D.C. (1792-1829) -The official residence of the president of the U.S.A was designed by James Hoban, an Irish architect, in the English Palladian Style. After damaged sustained in the war of 1812, it was restored and considerable restoration has been carried out in the present century. The porticoes were designed by B.H. Latrobe.

White House, Washington, .D.C.

James Hoban (c.1758 December 8, 1831) was an Irish architect, best known for designing the White House in Washington, D.C.

2. ROBIE HOUSE, Chicago (1908) by Frank Lloyd wright, is dominated externally by its strong horizontal lines which seem to make it almost one with the land on which it is built. Constructed of fine, small brick with lowpitched hipped roofs, the house is planned in an open and informal manner, interesting use being made of changes of level internally, the flowing internal spaces being generated by a central core containing staircase and fireplaces.

ROBIE HOUSE, Chicago (1908}

Frank Lloyd Wright (born Frank Lincoln Wright, June 8, 1867 April 9, 1959) was an American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1000 structures and completed 532 works.

3. Monticello, near Charlottesville, Virginia (1793) -was designed by Thomas Jefferson third president of the U.S.A. For his own use. The first house, and elegant example of colonial Georgian, was completely remodelled in a free and imaginative palladian manner.

Thomas Jefferson (April 13 [O.S. April 2] 1743 July 4, 1826) was an American Founding Father, the principal author of the Declaration of Independence (1776) and the third President of the United States (18011809).

Monticello, near Charlottesville, Virginia (1793}

Massachusetts State House (1798, in a drawing by Alexander Jackson Davis, 1827

4. BILTMORE, Ashville, North Carolina (1890-5) by R.M. Hunt, the first American architect to be trained at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, in the style of an early French Renaissance chateau.

BILTMORE, Ashville, North Carolina {1890-5)

Richard Morris Hunt (October 31, 1827 July 31, 1895) was an American architect of the nineteenth century and a preeminent figure in the history of American architecture. Hunt was, according to design critic Paul Goldberger writing in The New York Times, "American architecture's first, and in many ways its greatest, statesman.

5. STOUGHTON HOUSE, Cambridge, Mass (1882-3) by Mckim, Mead and White, is a timber-framed house, its walls clad externally with wood shingles providing an important example of the so called shingle style.

STOUGHTON HOUSE, Cambridge, Mass (1882-3)

Charles Follen McKim (August 24, 1847 September 14, 1909)[1] was an American Beaux-Arts architect of the late 19th century. Along with Stanford White, he provided the architectural expertise as a member of the partnership McKim, Mead & White.

Stanford White (November 9, 1853 June 25, 1906) was an American architect and partner in the architectural firm of McKim, Mead & White, the frontrunner among Beaux-Arts firms.

William Rutherford Mead (August 20, 1846 June 19, 1928) was an American architect, and was the "Center of the Office" of McKim, Mead, and White, a noted Gilded Age architectural firm.

Examples (Domestic Buildings)

STOUGHTON HOUSE, Cambridge, Mass (1882-3) An external cladding of wood Shingles over a timber frame became popular in domestic building during the second half on the 19th century. Internally, the plan arrangement shows a loosening and foreshadows the Free Plan, to be developed later by Frank Lloyd Wright.

6. WINSLOW HOUSE, RIVER FOREST, Illinois (1893), the first important work of Frank Lloyd Wright, a simple structure, basically symmetrical, but its hipped roof, wide projecting eaves and emphatic horizontal lines foreshadow the architects later work and what was to become known as the Praire House.

Examples (Religious Buildings)

The First CHURCH of CHRIST SCIENTIST, BERKELEY, CALIFORNIA (1910-12) By Bernard Maybeck, provided an article to the antidote to the epidemic of old-Spanish-Mission revivalism, which was threatening to engulf architecture in California. It uses natural materials, and owes something to the vernacular tradition of the west coast of America.

Bernard Ralph Maybeck (February 7, 1862 October 3, 1957) was an American architect in the Arts and Crafts Movement of the early 20th century. He was a professor at University of California, Berkeley.

Examples (Religious Buildings)

TRINITY CHURCH BOSTON, Massachusets (1872-7) By H.H. Richardson, is one of the key monuments of American architecture. The design, chosen competition, although basically Romanesque in character, is handled in a master full and imaginative way. A Greek cross plan, the building is dominated by a square central tower with round corner turrets, and is constructed mainly of red granite, the rock-faced texture of which is exploited. Internal decoration in encaustic colour was carried out by J.F. Lafange, while the west porch was added in 1897 to the designs of Shepley, Rutan, and Coolidge.

Henry Hobson Richardson (September 29, 1838 April 27, 1886) was a prominent American architect who designed buildings in Albany, Boston, Buffalo, Chicago, Pittsburg, and other cities

Examples (Religious Buildings)

UNITY TEMPLE, OAK PARK, ILLINOIS (1905-7)

Frank Lloyd Wright,

by Frank Lloyd Wright, is characterized by the sturdy simplicity of its external massing, on which the design relies rather than eclectic detail. In the building, the architect displayed a knowledge of and sympathy with the natural qualities of materials, which are here exploited both externally ( in the pebble-faced concrete of the walls) and internally (in the sand-lime plaster work and natural details)

Examples (Educational, Civic and Public Buildings)

The STATE CAPITOL, Richmond, Virginia (1789-98)

Thomas Jefferson,

by Thomas Jefferson, was based on a Roman temple prototype, the Maisan Carree, Nimes. An ionic order was used by Jefferson, while for the Fenestration of the cella he had recourse to Palladian formulae. The building is regarded as the first truly Neo-classic monument in the U.S. and had much influence on later American buildings, Classical temple forms, were adapted for banks, schools and other buildings, accommodation being sometimes ruthlessly crammed into the cella in order to retain, at all costs, the external lines of the antique form

Examples (Educational, Civic and Public Buildings)

The UNITED STATES Capitol, Washington D.C. seat of the United States government, has become, with its crowning dome, one of the worlds best known planned on Palladian lines with a central rotunda; this has survived in essentials, despite numerous modifications and additions. After the war, B.H. Latrobe was responsible for rebuilding the structure. Between 1851 and 1867 additions were made by Thomas Ustick Walter who designed the flanking wings and great dome over the central rotunda, and was constructed largely of cast iron, with an internal diameter of 30 m and a total height of 68 m.

Benjamin Henry Boneval Latrobe (May 1, 1764 September 3, 1820) was a British neoclassical architect who immigrated to the United States and is best known for his design of the United States Capitol, along with his work on the Old Baltimore Cathedral or The Baltimore Basilica, the first Roman Catholic Cathedral constructed in the United States

Thomas Ustick Walter, born Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, was an American architect, the dean of American architecture between the 1820 death of Benjamin Latrobe and the emergence of H.H. Richardson in the 1870s.

Examples (Educational, Civic and Public Buildings)

The NATIONAL ACADEMY of DESIGN, NEW YORK

(1862-5) by P.B. Wight , Venetian (Gothic in style and making full use of polychrome masonry patterning, shows the indfluence of the writings of John Ruskin.

Peter B. Wight (18381925) was a 19thcentury architect from New York City who worked there and in Chicago.

Examples (Educational, Civic and Public Buildings)

The PUBLIC LIBRARY, BOSTON, Massachusetts (1887-93)

by Mckim, Mead and White is beautifully detailed buildings, representative of the best in the academic stream of late 19th and 20th century architecture in America.

Examples (Educational, Civic and Public Buildings)

The LINCOLN MEMORIAL WASHINGTON, D.C. (1911-22) By Henry Bacon, is in the form of an unpedimented Greek Doric peripteral temple, set on a high podium and surmounted by a simple attic. Executed in white marble, its detail is superlatively refined and in its scholarship and execution marks a peak in academic architecture.

Henry Bacon was an American Beaux-Arts architect who is best remembered for the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., which was his final project

Examples (Educational, Civic and Public Buildings)

The CHAPEL and Post Headquarters, U.S. Military Academy, West Point, N.Y.

romantically sited on a steep encarpment over looking the Hudson River, are the work of Cram, Goodhue and Ferguson, and provide examples of academic architecture in Gothic style.

Ralph Adams Cram (December 16, 1863 September 22, 1942) was a prolific and influential American architect of collegiate and ecclesiastical buildings, often in the Gothic Revival style.

Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue was an American architect celebrated for his work in neogothic design. He also designed notable typefaces, including Cheltenham and Merrymount for the Merrymount Press

Examples (Educational, Civic and Public Buildings)

The Temple of Scottish Rite, Washington D.C. (1916) A masonic temple design by John Russel Pope, is in the same tradition as the Lincoln memorial. Externally, it takes the form of a reconstruction of the Mausoleum Halicarnassos, but is somewhat ponderously handled.

John Russell Pope was an American architect whose firm is widely known for designing of the National Archives and Records Administration building, the Jefferson Memorial and the West Building of the National Gallery of Art, all in Washington, DC.

D. COMMERCIAL AND INDUSTRIAL BUILDINGS

1. MERCHANTS EXCHANGE Philadelphia (1832-4) by William Strickland, Is in the Greek revival style and is noteworthy for the grand, apsidal treatment of its rear elevation, enriched externally by a screen of Corinthian columns rising from first-floor level through two storeys, and crowned by a cupola based on the Choragic monument of Lysicrates, Athens.
William Strickland (November 1788 April 6, 1854), was a noted architect in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and Nashville, Tennessee. A student of Benjamin Latrobe and mentor to Thomas Ustick Walter, Strickland was one of the founders of the Greek Revival movement in the United States and an early proponent of railroads.[1]

MERCHANTS EXCHANGE Philadelphia (1832-4)

2. The Marshall Field Wholesale Warehouse, Chicago, Illinois {1885-7) by H.H. Richardson, had seven storeys and was of load bearing wall construction. A remarkably powerful design, with its great arched openings and the vigorous texture of its masonry. it had considerable influence on later buildings in Chicago and elsewhere.
Henry Hobson Richardson (September 29, 1838 April 27, 1886) was a prominent American architect who designed buildings in Albany, Boston, Buffalo, Chicago, Pittsburgh, and other cities. The style he popularized is named for him: Richardsonian Romanesque. Along with Louis Sullivan and Frank Lloyd Wright, Richardson is one of "the recognized trinity of American architecture".

The Marshall Field Wholesale Warehouse, Chicago, Illinois {1885-7)

3. The Auditorium Building, Chicago, Illinois (1886-9) by Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan. combined with an opera house with hotel and office accomodation and owes much of its external character to Richardson's Marshall Field warehouse. Ten storeys high, it is of loadbearing wall construction built on spread foundations. Settlements has occurred to one side of the structure, in the tower which rises nearly 30m higher than the main building. Internally, the details are of high order. many showing a Byzantine character and some probably designed by Frank Uoyd Wright, who entered Sullivans's office as a draughtsman in 1887.
Louis Henry Sullivan (September 3, 1856 April 14, 1924)[1] was an American architect, and has been called the "father of skyscrapers"[2] and "father of modernism".

The Auditorium Building, Chicago, Illinois

Dankmar Adler (July 3, 1844 April 16, 1900) was a celebrated German-born American architect.

4. The MONADNOCK Building, Chicago Illinois (1889-911, by Daniel Burnham, has six teen storeys .. The building derives distinctior fro.m the simplicity of its elevational treatmen and was the last tall building in Chicago fo which load-bearing walls were employed.

The MONADNOCK Building, Chicago Illinois

Daniel Hudson Burnham, FAIA (September 4, 1846 June 1, 1912) was an American architect and urban designer.

5. The SECOND Leiter Building. Chicago II linois (188990l by W. Le B. Jenny, is an eight - storey metal framed building with a sim pie and effective elevational treatment, the stone facade reading as a sheath over the internal metal structure.
William Le Baron Jenney (September 25, 1832 June 14, 1907) was an American architect and engineer who is known for building the first skyscraper in 1884 and became known as the Father of the American skyscraper.

The SECOND Leiter Building. Chicago II linois

6. The RELIANCE Building, Chicago Illinois ( 1890) by Burnham and Root, was originally built as a four-storeyed structure but was later extended to sixteen floors. The terra-cotta facing to the metal frame was reduced to a minimum and its simple yet carefully - detailed elevation the building marks an important advance in skyscraper design.

John Wellborn Root (January 10, 1850 January 15, 1891) was an American architect who worked out of Chicago with Daniel Burnham.

The RELIANCE Building, Chicago Illinois

Daniel Hudson Burnham, FAIA (September 4, 1846 June 1, 1912) was an American architect and urban designer.

7. The GACE BUILDING, Chicago, Illinois (1898-9) by Louis Sullivan and Holabird and Roche, is a three-bay eight-storey framed structure, and force shadows the elevational treatment of the Schlesinger-Mayer store.
Louis Henry Sullivan (September 3, 1856 April 14, 1924)[1] was an American architect, and has been called the "father of skyscrapers"[2] and "father of modernism".

Kevin Roche, FAIA born Eamonn Kevin Roche (June 14, 1922), is an Irish-born American Pritzker Prize-winning architect.

John Augur Holabird (18861945) was a significant United States architect based in Chicago. Born on May 4, 1886, the day of Chicago's Haymarket Riot, he was the son of architect William Holabird. John Gage Buildings - Chicago, Illinois. Holabird trained as an engineer,

8. The SCHLESINGER-MAYER STORE (189919041 by Louis Sullivan, was originally a ninestorey structure, a twelve-storey section being added in 1903-4 and further additions by D. H. Burnham. The building was originally crowned by a rich overhanging cornice. The white terracotta facing to the building's steel frame truthfully follows its structure, and horizontal lines are emphasized. The ground and first floors have cast-metal friezes richly decorated in low relief, providing first-rate examples of Sullivan's decorative work, in some ways sug gestive of European Art Noveau.

Louis Henry Sullivan (September 3, 1856 April 14, 1924)[1] was an American architect, and has been called the "father of skyscrapers"[2] and "father of modernism".

9. The WAINWRIGHT BUILDING, St. Louis, MO. {1890-1) by Adler and Sullivan, a tenstorey steel-framed building, provided an answer to the elevation problem of the skyscraper. Vertical members of the frame are emphasized externally as brick piers, and the building is capped by a deep, richly decorated frieze, pierced by circular windows lighting the top floor, while the recessed panels between floors are similarly decorated.
Dankmar Adler (July 3, 1844 April 16, 1900) was a celebrated German-born American architect.

10. The LARKIN SOAP CO. BUILDING Buffalo N.Y. (1904-51 by Frank lloyd Wright, was designed around a central circulation court, lit from the roof and sides by windows sealed from noise and dirt. Offices were approached from galleries around the court, borne on brick piers. Externally, the building was characterized by the simplicity and scale of its massing, which relied entirety on the relation of clearly articulated rectnagular forms.

Frank Lloyd Wright (born Frank Lincoln Wright, June 8, 1867 April 9, 1959) was an American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1000 structures and completed 532 works.

11. The WOOLWORTH Building, New York (1911-13) by Cass Gilbert, 241m high with fiftytwo storeys, was carried out in the Gothic style and provides an important landmark in the story of high building.

Cass Gilbert (November 24, 1859 May 17, 1934) was a prominent[1][2] American architect.[

12. Soon after the completion of the Woolworth

Building, the New York City zoning Ordinance (1916) became law. This had a profound effect on the form of New York Skyscrapers which, for reasons of light and ventilation, were now required to have certain minimum set -backs, related to their height. The effects of the ordinance can be seen in the Panhellenic House 1928 by J.M. Howells with twenty seven storeys and in the EMPIRE STATE BUILDING {1930-2) by Shreve, Lamb and Harmon, which rises through eighty-five storeys.
William Frederick Lamb, FAIA (November 21, 1893 September 8, 1952), was one of the principal designers of the Empire State Building.

Richmond Harold Shreve (June 25, 1877, Cornwallis, Nova Scotia September 11, 1946, Hastingson-Hudson, New York) was a renowned Canadian architect.

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