10 Buildings

Chateaus de Versaille
Location: Versaille, France
Year(s) built: 1661-1774
Architects/Designers: (1st round) Louis Le Vau, architect. Charles Le Brun, interior designer. Andre Le Notre, landscape architect. (2nd round) Jules Hardin-Monsart
Type/ purpose: royal residence and palace for King Louis XIV
Style: Baroque
Unique/interesting features: More is never enough with Baroque design especially for Louis XIV. Every inch of wall and ceiling are painted with designs, portraits, and allegorical murals. Sixty-seven staircases in the (then) new style of open stairwells let in light, improved movement through the spaces, and gave people a place to be seen. Louis XIV moved his entire government out of Paris and into Versaille, which at its peak, housed 5000 people. The grounds included tremendous areas of formal gardens. Landscapers created geometric shapes with parterres (planted beds framed with hedges). Fourteen hundred fountains with water provided by the Seine River were scattered thoughout the gardens and paths.


Paddington Station
Location: London, England
Year(s) built: 1852-1854
Architects/Designers: Islamband Kingdom Brunel (his name sounds like a country!) Born in Portsmouth, England (b.1806-d.1859) he was an engineer/architect. After working many years for his father, he was appointed chief engineer of the Great Western Railroad in 1833. He was a prolific designer of tunnels, railways, bridges, prefabricated buildings, and ships. He expanded the use of iron and used wrought iron and cast iron for, what were then, new purposes. He is considered one of the key figures in bringing about the Industrial Revolution. The ornamentation of Paddington Station was done by Matthew Digby Wyatt, because Brunel felt is was the one area of building for which he had little talent.
Type/ purpose: Train station (still operational)
Style: Victorian
Unique/interesting features: Made of wrought iron and cast iron. High, arching ceilings allow for air circulation, and a feeling of spaciousness. Light enters through glass ceilings.

Empire State Building
Location: New York, New York
Year(s) built: 1931 (in middle of Great Depression)
Architects/Designers: Shreve, Lamb, and Harmon
Type/ purpose: Commercial office tower, skyscraper
Style: Art Deco
Unique/interesting features: Built as testament to American strength and resiliency during Great Depression. At 102 stories it was the largest building in the world from 1931-1972 when the World Trade Towers were built. Materials include: 60,000 tons of structured steel; 200,000 cubic feet ofIndiana limestone and granite. Design: The setbacks offset the optical illusions of height and emphasize the tower. Interior: The lobby is 5 stories tall, an "art deco masterpiece" of granite, marble, and brushed stainless steel. It has huge bronze medallions to celebrate the laborers and craftsmen who worked on the building (about 100 workers died during construction). A metal mosaic shows the Empire State Building as the center of the Universe.

The Robie House
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Year(s) built: 1909
Architects/Designers: Frank Lloyd Wright
Type/ purpose: family residence
Style: Prairie Style
Unique/interesting features: The quintessential Prairie Style house. Exterior: Flat, low-pitched rooflines with long overhangs covering multiple patios and porches. Wright calculated the pitch and length of the overhangs so that rooms stayed shaded in the summer. Horizontal lines predominate; even the brick joints are raked on the horizontal. Interior: House has 3 levels. Rooms on a grid system. Dining and living areas on the main floor are really one space divided by a fireplace and chimney. Bedrooms are on the upper level, and a playroom and billiard room are on the lower level. There is no basement. Decor: Wood furniture, stone fireplace and chimney. ceilings have are wood supports with white plaster (?) panels, which reminded me of the ceilings in medieval English halls. Many windows have stained glass accents. Great Buildings.com notes that there is a "high degree of integration of the mechanical and electrical systems designed by Wright into the visual expression of the interior". This is intriguing, but I found no more info on it. Are the ducts, etc. visible?

Bag End (Hobbit Hole)
Location: The Shire
Year(s) built: 2889 Third Age
Architects/Designers: Bungo and Belladonna Baggin's (Bilbo's parents)
Type/ purpose: Home
Style: Hobbit Hole (Earth sheltered structure)
Unique/interesting features: "His house was perfect, whether you liked food, or sleep, or work, or story-telling, or singing, or just sitting and thinking best, or a pleasant mixture of them all."
Bilbo's house was an earth-sheltered ( and therefore highly energy efficient) hobbit hole with a green door and a large brass door knob. Round windows let in light and warmth, perfect for an afternoon nap. The home had "countless rooms": bedrooms, bathrooms, dining rooms, living areas, rooms for clothes, and many pantries for storing comestibles. The ceilings are white plaster with wood . They are arched, and tall enough for a human or wizard to stand with just a whisper of a stoop.

Dogtrot House
Location: Upland south, Louisiana and Florida, Appalachian mountain region
Year(s): Pre-civil war
Architect/Designer: Vernacular
Type/purpose: House
Unique/interesting features: These one-story houses were characterized by an open breezeway (dogtrot) that ran through the middle of the structure from front to back. The dogtrot was flanked on either side by rooms. They sometimes had rear shed rooms. A chimney was placed at each end of the building, and a front porch ran its length. The breezeway coupled with exterior windows in each room provided a type of passive cooling system of cross ventilation. This symmetrical structure was a "frontiersman's attempt to build a formal, ... Georgian central hall house" (see site).

Azuma House
Location: Osaka, Japan
Year(s): 1976
Architect/Designer: Tadao Ando
Type/purpose: Row House
Unique/interesting features: This is a one bedroom, one bathroom home in an urban neighborhood. It is 10.5 feet wide and 42 feet long with a total of about 700 square feet on two floors. Because only the front living room faces the street and the rest of the house is organized around a central courtyard behind the living room, the house is buffered from the "hustle and bustle" of the city. All the rooms open onto the courtyard which provides natural light and cool breezes in a semitropical climate.

Charles Moore House
Type/purpose: House
Location: Orinda, California
Year: 1962
Architect/Designer: Charles Moore
Type/Purpose: Neo-vernacular house
Unique/interesting features: The original house was 25 feet square. It was supported by steel trusses with a wood frame. Sliding walls opened the house to the outside. The interior was organized around two aedicules which divided the areas of the house. The cantilevered roof had dramatic overhangs which seemed to float over the house. Moore bought the house because he though the site "seem[ed] full of magic". He was inspired by the "primitive" huts of Mayan and Hindu temples and the Trenton Bathhouse by Louis I. Kahn. The house was "drastically remodeled" in 2006 (pictured).

Frank Gehry House
Type/purpose: House
Location: Santa Monica, California
Year: 1978
Architect/Designer: Frank Gehry
Type/Purpose: Deconstructivist
Unique/interesting features: Yep this house, set in the suburbs, has Frank Gehry written all over it. Gehry bought an existing house and wrapped it in corrugated metal with accents made of chain link fencing. He added large glass openings off square. It is a conglomeration of angles and slanted roof lines. Like most of Gehry's work the house is more sculpture than architecture. Gehry was influenced by Robert Rauschenberg; as a result his buildings often look like metal and glass collages.