Today we have a broad palette of colors for buildings. But it wasn’t always that way. You may know that paint color was historically limited, so it is understandable that other materials would have limited colors as well. In fact, material types have in some cases created regional identities. For example, the Chicago common brick.… Read More Cream City
The Longaberger Company may have gone out of business in 2018 but they left a large reminder of their products just east of Newark, Ohio, in the form of a seven-story version of the Longaberger medium market basket. Not only is the building known as the world’s largest basket, it’s also one of the largest… Read More Sometimes Architecture’s a Picnic (Literally)
Springfield, Illinois, is perhaps best known for its association with President Abraham Lincoln. It is home to Lincoln’s house, office, and tomb. Its historically significant architecture, however, do not stop there. In 1902, just 41 years after Lincoln was elected president and moved from Springfield to Washington, DC, a woman named Susan Lawrence commissioned Frank… Read More Discovering the Dana Thomas House
Lake Geneva is known, among other things, as “the Newport of the Midwest.” So it should come as no surprise that, like Newport, its historic summer mansions left by the 19th century’s elite are balanced by a public walking trail that encircles the entire lake. Much like Newport’s Cliff Walk, the trail primarily skirts backyards… Read More A Historic Trail Through the Midwest’s Best Backyards: Lake Geneva, Wisconsin
This weekend, a selection Frank Lloyd Wright’s buildings joined the Unesco World Heritage List. The listing, named the 20th-Century Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright, includes eight buildings across the United States: Unity Temple (Oak Park, IL) Robie House (Chicago, IL) Taliesin (Spring Green, WI) Herbert and Katherine Jacobs House (Madison, WI) Fallingwater (Mill Run, PA) Hollyhock House (Los Angeles,… Read More Frank Lloyd Wright: New UNESCO World Heritage Site
When it comes to new additions on old buildings, historic preservationists skew into two camps: (1) that the addition should look similar to the historic building, and (2) that the should addition look different. It is a continuum, of course, and many people may find they stand somewhere in the middle. Additions should be compatible… Read More Historic Preservation’s Addition Dilemma
Painted signs on buildings were the billboards of the nineteenth century. They could be large and numerous. Today, reminders of these signs grace older buildings throughout cities from London to Chicago in the form of “ghost signs“: faded remnants of painted signs that disappear a little more each year. In most cases these signs are… Read More Lincoln’s Law Office: Bringing Ghost Signs Back to Life
I recently came across one of Oak Park’s tile stop signs and quickly discovered that they are several scattered throughout the village at the ends of alleys. So what’s the story? The signs were likely installed in the 1930s-40s to remind drivers to stop before exiting alleys. As the village does not have right-of-way in… Read More Oak Park’s Tile Stop Signs
A trip to Cape Cod is a trip into lighthouse history. Lighthouses span the coasts (and can even be found in the Midwest) but until rotating lenses were introduced, there was no way to really know which light house you were seeing from the water. The rotating lenses are what allows lighthouses to develop a unique… Read More Shining the Light on Lighthouses
When you think of Frank Lloyd Wright, usually the expensive masterpieces come to mind: Fallingwater, the Guggenheim, and the Robie House (I previously wrote about Robie here and here!). Wright was, however, interested throughout his career in designing affordable architecture for all Americans. Intrigued? Look no further than Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Frank Lloyd Wright collaborated with the… Read More Affordable Housing, Milwaukee, and Frank Lloyd Wright
Susie Trexler 