Just when did this all begin to shift around? Was it when back in 1987 when Gehry, known then for his “chain-link architecture,” and David Childs, of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill’s New York office, went after the Madison Square Garden competition? The scheme didn’t go anywhere, but the architectural community took note of the new bedfellows.
The appearance of the high-design architect—say Frank Lloyd Wright or Le Corbusier—being summoned to take up a major commission in foreign city is hardly new; it happened with Wright in the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo in 1915, and Le Corbusier, in a diminished role at the United Nations headquarters in New York from 1947 to 1953. Nor is the cobbled-together collaboration novel: Around 1954, when Mies van der Rohe came to New York City from Chicago to design the Seagram Building, Kahn and Jacobs was brought in as associate architect to oversee the production phase, and, in an unusual move, Philip Johnson was hired as a “co-design architect.” Since Mies didn’t have a New York State license at that time, he needed Kahn and Jacobs to sign the drawings. And Johnson, himself in the process of getting his license, was perceived as a proper enough Miesian disciple to carry out the master’s design in the event the 68-year-old architect had a tough time making the long commute.
You have 0 complimentary articles remaining.
Unlimited access + premium benefits for as low as $1.99/month.