Midcentury masters

Those Modern structural design engineers engaged the next generation, who by the 1950s and 1960s inserted themselves into larger consultancy roles for new building typologies, such as massive skyscraper projects. For example, Frederick Severud, with architect Matthew Nowicki, made possible the design of the suspended roof of the Raleigh Arena in North Carolina (1952). With its unique saddle shape, it fast became a pilgrimage stop for engineers Frank Newby, Ted Happold, and Frei Otto on their first visits to the U.S. in the early 1950s. Severud’s ability to free structure to express the potentials of nonlinear space, breaking away from the rigid grid, also inspired Eero Saarinen’s concrete shell for Ingalls Rink in New Haven (1956–59).