Corporate Modernism and The American Skyscraper Eero Saarinen Louis Kahn slide sequence courtesy of Professor Babe Mies van der Rohe Eero Saarinen was born in Finland and emigrated to the US as a young boy His father Eliel Saarinen was a famous architect who taught at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomsfield MI There Eero took courses in sculpture and furniture design and met future collaborator Charles and Ray Eames Eero went on to receive his architecture degree at Yale Eero Saarinen 1910 1961 Charles Eames and Eero Saarinen Organic Chair 1940 for the Organic Design in Home Furnishings Competition at MoMA Tulip chair 1956 by Eero Saarinen Manufactured by Knoll 2 18 2015 1 The first major work by Saarinen in collaboration with his father was the General Motors Technical Center in Warren Michigan 1956 The design follows the Miesian style incorporating steel and glass With the success of this project Saarinen was invited by other major American corporations to design their new headquarters John Deere IBM and CBS While the exteriors were rectilinear the interiors usually contained sweeping staircases akin to the organic shapes of his furniture designs However some of his most famous concrete buildings such as the WA terminal and the Dulles airport have organic shapes inside and out These buildings are famous for their thin concrete shell structures whose forms are derived from the catenary arch TWA Terminal Kennedy Airport New York City 1956 62 Eero Saarinen 2 18 2015 2 The curvilinear forms of the TWA and Dulles Airports are based on the geometry of a catenary chain Definition the catenary is the curve that an idealized hanging chain or cable assumes under its own weight when supported only at its ends The geometry of its curve is determined by the weight of the material and the force of gravity The catenary is often used in inverted form such that the arch is more or less self supporting Source http en wikipedia org wiki Catenary Antoni Gaudi s Catenary Model c 1920 Gateway Arch in St Louis by Eero Saarinen 1965 Dulles Airport Chantilly VA 1958 62 Eero Saarinen 2 18 2015 3 2 18 2015 4 Louis Kahn Louis Kahn Click to add text Yale University Art Gallery New Haven Connecticut 1951 53 Yale University Art Gallery New Haven Connecticut 1951 53 long span structure allows for an open interior triangulated coffers in the ceiling slab combines strength and lightness and are poured out of concrete The distinction between served and servant spaces servant spaces such as mechanical equipment are neatly tucked into voided spaces within the structure all structure is exposed The triangular formwork of the ceiling slab is continued in other places such as the stairs and the skylights as a poetic motif 2 18 2015 5 Yale University Art Gallery New Haven Connecticut 1951 53 Click to add text Louis Kahn Salk Institute for Biological Studies La Jolla California 1959 65 Jonas Salk was a famous scientist who discovered the vaccine for polio Kahn is interested in how buildings serve the community He therefore made spaces that were not programmed but served a civic function such as this open plaza 2 18 2015 6 Travertine marble civic plaza concrete and wood offices Offices for the researchers had windows that were angled so that each office had a view of the ocean 2 18 2015 7 2 18 2015 Labs require lots of servant space This is housed within the floor slab permitting flexible arrangement of labs Huge lab spaces are free of columns One bay is 30 ft wide Louis Kahn Kimbell Art Museum Fort Worth Texas 1966 72 8 2 18 2015 9 A single bay has four points columns and each bay is more than 100 ft long The structural grid is pulled apart into a tartan grid to accommodate servant spaces Day lit museum Galleries cannot have direct sunlight Strip of skylight at the apex of the vault are covered with stainless steel screens which reflect the sunlight off the vaults creating a luminous sheen on the surface of the concrete The vaults seem to glow 2 18 2015 10 Louis Khan Kimbell Art Museum 1967 1972 Cycloid Shaped Shell Structure Four points carry the load The arch of the barrel vault of the Kimbell Museum is based on the geometry of a cycloid Definition A cycloid is the curve traced by a point on the rim of a circular wheel as the wheel rolls along a straight line It is an example of a roulette a curve generated by a curve rolling on another curve Source http en wikipedia org wiki Cycloid Piranesi Plan of Rome 1762 Kahn was educated in the Neo classical style architecture of the Beaux arts school He discovered modern architecture from teaching it Unlike Le Corbusier he accepted aspects of classical architecture Kahn had a facsimile of Piranesi s fantastic map of Rome and hung it on his office wall It is one of the inspirations behind Kahn s idea of served and servant spaces 2 18 2015 11 2 18 2015 12 Louis Kahn National Assembly Building Dhaka Bangladesh 1962 73 Louis Kahn National Assembly Building Dhaka Bangladesh 1962 73 Dhaka new capitol of Bangladesh Bangladesh is extremely poor but Kahn gave the city a monument that it is proud of to this day The humid climate requires sun shading Outer walls are like a shell protecting the served spaces inside Geometrical openings are monumental 2 18 2015 Kahn s plan is reminiscent of Piranesi s plan of Rome Prayer hall on the right side is slightly rotated off the main axis so that it directly faces Mecca the holiest city in Islam Strips of marble were cast into the walls as if to project a pattern onto concrete Kahn made his buildings poetic Louis Khan National Capital of Bangladesh 1962 1983 13 Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in America 1886 1969 ARCH 350 Spring 2015 Maki Iisaka Museum of Fine Arts Houston 1958 1974 Photo David Kerr Universal Space Farnsworth House Plano National Theatre Mannheim S R Crown Hall IIT Chicago 50 x50 House Convention Hall Chicago Ron Bacardi Administration Building Santiago Cuba New National Gallery Berlin It then became clear to me that it was not the task of architecture to invent form quoted by Peter Carter in Architectural Design March 1961 from Kenneth Frampton Modern Architecture Functionalism or Rationalism Mies to H ring Make your spaces big enough man so that you can walk around in them freely and not just in one predetermined direction Or are you all that sure of how they will be used We don t know at all whether people will do with them what we expect them to Functions are not so clear or so constant they change faster than the building