Early 20th Century Styles
We will continue our exploration of how and why architectural
styles developed in America, and we will work on our continued
identification of American building styles
So following the Industrial Revolution, where we saw a lot
of change, particularly in downtown cities and factories
became more and more widespread
And then, of course, as we started to develop factory tones
throughout the country side, we saw again a revival of classical
styles, particularly Neo-gothic, New Gothic and Greek Revival
These come at a period when both form and order are considered
necessary to reintroduce to the American public
So we again see this used on educational facilities, institutions
government buildings
But we also see it used for wealthy homes
Again, thinking about the way high style architecture is
afforded to wealthier folks
This is very true again, during this other period of classical
revival through the early 1900's through the 20s
As we begin to explore air travel and we begin to have international
air travel, we now have global influence on architecture
in America
We can definitely see this
One of the great examples is the Frank Lloyd Wright Robie house
in which Frank Lloyd Wright uses lines and curves that were
influenced by Japanese architecture
We can see these sort of flat, low roofs with the roofs extending
to cover these porches
We see a lot of play with interior exterior spaces in a lot
of his houses
We talked about falling water previously, a lot of interior
exterior play, a lot of natural elements coming into the
structures. And he is a master of this and start to see global
influence coming into a lot of architecture in America from
this point on
Really, from this point on, as everything becomes more and
more accessible, not just with travel but with communication
Eventually with the internet, architectural style becomes
less defined by geography, which is really interesting
We definitely still have architectural style that is regional
or very, very local, especially in vernacular style
But high style now becomes sort of a mesh of other ideas
that from other places, which is quite interesting
As we move forward following the Great Depression, we see
sort of an ode to economic recovery with the Art Deco style
which, of course, flies in the face of the arts and crafts
movement. We're moving away from simplicity, and we're really
moving back into over the top details and extreme expensive
No cost is spared for these types of structures
We're going very tall because we can we're going very detailed
ornate because we can we see these gargoyles that are
evident from the bottom story all the way to the top, and
they're large, they're expensive.
They speak to wealth and they speak to design
And that's what Art Deco wanted to do
Moving into one of my favorite periods into modernism
We, of course, have to reject this grandiose gesture that
our decor brought us and move into something more simplistic
If you're picking up on a pattern here
We often go from classic to elaborate to simple to classic
to elaborate to simple
And arguably the pattern stops here
But I think we could still maybe pick up the pattern in very
unique ways as we move forward here
So, of course, modernism is the simple phase
We have a rejection of everything that we knew about architecture
in an attempt to come up with something completely different
and new
So we're not only going for simple lines, straight lines
rectangles squares, et cetera, but we're trying to incorporate
some of the new technology, some of the new material that
we've developed over this time period
We're starting to play with concrete
We're starting to play with steel more
We're starting to play tricks on the mind with shapes as
well. If you recall the columns on the arts and crafts structure
on the bungalows that were wide at the bottom and narrow
on the top to express this very sort of rudimentary waiting
system of these columns are holding up the awning
Modernism seeks to reject that
Maybe things are floating, maybe things are held up by magic
Maybe you have questions, or maybe you just accept it as
it is
I love this example of this modern building because we have
these very simple square windows and rectangular windows
but we also have a round window
It's the only one that we can see on this plane, and it sort
of stands out to me as a rejection and a playfulness of what
you classically thought
Architecture could and would be
Of course, modernism is very complex, and we have a lot of
subcategories to it
One of the subcategories to it is brutalism, which embraces
the sort of unwavering concrete building that might be cold
not only to the touch but also emotionally cold
It maybe invokes a feeling of governance of structure
It's very dominating to the landscape
This type of structure again speaks to the technology and
the material that was available at the time
It's really our first time using concrete as appliable material
We see a lot of playfulness with concrete
We see prefabricated concrete being shipped onto the site
So it's made in a factory made in these sort of weird geometric
patterns are made to fit together like a puzzle and being
brought on to a site which has not been done before
We see the limits of structure being pushed
We see some really heavy materials starting to move skyward
with brutalism
I think there's a lot of beauty and brutalism
I think that there's there's a way to consider these very
dominating and controversial buildings with respect to the
material in respect to the technology here, we can definitely
say that because of brutalism, we understand concrete as
a material even better than we did before, and we can push
the boundaries with a lot of materials more than we did before
An additional subcategory for modernism is formalism, which
I think is really interesting in that modernism is often
considered a rejection of sort of classical styles
But I think formalism is maybe embracing some of these classical
styles, but with a new twist, formalism asks that every component
of the building be self contained
We're looking back to columns, but we're not looking to make
these columns elaborate
We're looking back to simple roof lines, but we're stopping
there. We're not adding triangles or a tablet hers to the
roof lines
We are keeping everything as straightforward as we possibly
could. They're subtle detailing, but it's not going to be
obvious. It's not going to be representative of dominance
or of education
Really, the dominance and the education comes from how simple
the structure appears to be
I often say that creating something very simple, like a building
is incredibly difficult.
So if you're looking to create something that's very sleek
doesn't have a lot to it
It's very challenging compared to something that's very elaborate
because there's in something that's elaborate
There's all these ways to not only hide mistakes, but to
also hide structural elements, support structures, et cetera
But in something very simple in formalism, everything needs
to be subtle, and everything needs to be utilitarian or anything
beautiful needs to not detract from the simplicity of the
structure, which is very challenging to do so now let's talk
about some century vernacular structures here.
I'm sure as many urban planners are aware throughout the
century, we see car ownership.
Car culture starts to emerge in America and really dominate
America by the 50s.
So as we see this rise in car centrism through the 20s through
the 40s, et cetera
We start to see a rise in vernacular structures to serve
this new phenomenon, we see fuel stations, hotels, park,
the Park Ranger offices, travel centers all starting to emerge
in response to this particular object, which is fascinating.
I think often we don't think about these structures as significant,
and that's sort of.
The point of examining vernacular architecture is to examine
things that we might just walk past or might ignore as part
of our everyday life.
If we examine the architecture of, say, a gas station in
this particular example, we see maybe a Mission Revival style
gas station.
But we also see that this gas station has an awning, and
the Awning really speaks to the usefulness of the gas station.
What the gas station is prepared to give you.
I'm not going to spend a lot of time talking about Car central
vernacular architecture, because that could be a whole series
in and of itself.
But know that through this time period, we start to see these
structures emerge, and then we also start to see these structures
arguably taken for granted as they emerge.
And as car culture becomes so ingrained into who we are as
Americans, so they sort of become present and then disappear
on our landscape without actually disappearing.