Chapter 31

ARCHITECTURE IN THE UNITED STATES.

BOOKS RECOMMENDED: As before, Fergusson, Statham. Also, Chandler, _The Colonial Architecture of Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia_. Cleaveland and Campbell, _American Landmarks_. Corner and Soderholz, _Colonial Architecture in New England_. Crane and Soderholz, _Examples of Colonial Architecture in Charleston and Savannah_. Drake, _Historic Fields and Mansions of Middlesex_. Everett, _Historic Churches of America_. King, _Handbook of Boston_; _Handbook of New York_. Little, _Early New England Interiors_. Schuyler, _American Architecture_. Van Rensselaer, _H. H. Richardson and His Works_. Wallis, _Old Colonial Architecture and Furniture_.

+GENERAL REMARKS.+ The colonial architecture of modern times presents a peculiar phenomenon. The colonizing nation, carrying into its new _habitat_ the tastes and practices of a long-established civilization, modifies these only with the utmost reluctance, under the absolute compulsion of new conditions. When the new home is virgin soil, destitute of cultivation, government, or civilized inhabitants, the accompaniments and activities of civilization introduced by the colonists manifest themselves at first in curious contrast to the primitive surroundings. The struggle between organized life and chaos, the laborious subjugation of nature to the requirements of our complex modern life, for a considerable period absorb the energies of the colonists. The amenities of culture, the higher intellectual life, the refinements of art can, during this period, receive little attention. Meanwhile a new national character is being formed; the people are undergoing the moral training upon which their subsequent achievements must depend. With the conquest of brute nature, however, and the gradual emergence of a more cultivated class, with the growth of commerce and wealth and the consequent increase of leisure, the humanities find more place in the colonial life. The fine arts appear in scattered centres determined by peculiarly favorable conditions. For a long time they retain the impress, and seek to reproduce the forms, of the art of the mother country. But new conditions impose a new development. Maturing commerce with other lands brings in foreign influences, to which the still unformed colonial art is peculiarly susceptible. Only with political and commercial independence, fully developed internal resources, and a high national culture do the arts finally attain, as it were, their majority, and enter upon a truly national growth.

These facts are abundantly illustrated by the architectural history of the United States. The only one among the British colonies to attain political independence, it is the only one among them whose architecture has as yet entered upon an independent course of development, and this only within the last twenty-five or thirty years. Nor has even this development produced as yet a distinctive local style. It has, however, originated new constructive methods, new types of buildings, and a distinctively American treatment of the composition and the masses; the decorative details being still, for the most part, derived from historic precedents. The architecture of the other British colonies has retained its provincial character, though producing from time to time individual works of merit. In South America and Mexico the only buildings of importance are Spanish, French, or German in style, according to the nationality of the architects employed. The following sketch of American architecture refers, therefore, exclusively to its development in the United States.

+FORMATIVE PERIOD.+ Buildings in stone were not undertaken by the early English colonists. The more important structures in the Southern and Dutch colonies were of brick imported from Europe. Wood was, however, the material most commonly employed, especially in New England, and its use determined in large measure the form and style of the colonial architecture. There was little or no striving for architectural elegance until well into the eighteenth century, when Wren’s influence asserted itself in a modest way in the Middle and Southern colonies. The very simple and unpretentious town-hall at Williamsburg, Va., and St. Michael’s, Charleston, are attributed to him; but the most that can be said for these, as for the brick churches and manors of Virginia previous to 1725, is that they are simple in design and pleasing in proportion, without special architectural elegance. The same is true of the wooden houses and churches of New England of the period, except that they are even simpler in design.

From 1725 to 1775 increased population and wealth along the coast brought about a great advance in architecture, especially in churches and in the dwellings of the wealthy. During this period was developed the _Colonial style_, based on that of the reigns of Anne and the first two Georges in England, and in church architecture on the models set by Wren and Gibbs. All the details were, however, freely modified by the general employment of wood. The scarcity of architects trained in Old World traditions contributed to this departure from classic precision of form. The style, especially in interior design, reflected the cultured taste of the colonial aristocracy in its refined treatment of the woodwork. But there was little or no architecture of a truly monumental character. Edifices of stone were singularly few, and administrative buildings were small and modest, owing to insufficient grants from the Crown, as well as to the poverty of the colonies.

The churches of this period include a number of interesting designs, especially pleasing in the forms of their steeples. The “+Old South+” at Boston (now a museum), Trinity at Newport, and +St. Paul’s+ at New York--one of the few built of stone (1764)--are good examples of the style. +Christ Church+ at Philadelphia (1727-35, by Dr. Kearsley) is another example, historically as well as architecturally interesting (Fig. 218); and there are scores of other churches almost equally noteworthy, scattered through New England, Maryland, Virginia, and the Middle States.

+DWELLINGS.+ These reflect better than the churches the varying tastes of the different colonies. Maryland and Virginia abound in fine brick manor-houses, set amid extensive grounds walled in and entered through iron gates of artistic design. The interior finish of these houses was often elaborate in conception and admirably executed. Westover (1737), Carter’s Grove (1737) in Virginia, and the Harwood and Hammond Houses at Annapolis, Md. (1770), are examples. The majority of the New England houses were of wood, more compact in plan, more varied and picturesque in design than those of the South, but wanting somewhat of their stateliness. The interior finish of wainscot, cornices, stairs, and mantelpieces shows, however, the same general style, in a skilful and artistic adaptation of classic forms to the slender proportions of wood construction. Externally the orders appear in porches and in colossal pilasters, with well designed entablatures, and windows of Italian model. The influence of the Adams and Sheraton furniture is doubtless to be seen in these quaint and often charming versions of classic motives. The Hancock House, Boston (of stone, demolished); the Sherburne House, Portsmouth (1730); Craigie House, Cambridge (1757, Fig. 219); and Rumford House, North Woburn (Mass.), are typical examples.

In the Middle States architectural activity was chiefly centred in Philadelphia and New York, and one or two other towns, where a number of manor-houses, still extant, attest the wealth and taste of the time. It is noticeable that the veranda or piazza was confined to the Southern States, but that the climate seems to have had little influence on the forms of roofs. These were gambrelled, hipped, gabled, or flat, alike in the North and South, according to individual taste.

+PUBLIC BUILDINGS.+ Of public and monumental architecture this period has little to show. Large cities did not exist; New York, Boston, and Philadelphia were hardly more than overgrown villages. The public buildings--court-houses and town-halls--were modest and inexpensive structures. The Old State House and Faneuil Hall at Boston, the Town Hall at Newport (R.I.), and Independence Hall at Philadelphia, the best known of those now extant, are not striking architecturally. Monumental design was beyond the opportunities and means of the colonies. It was in their churches, all of moderate size, and in their dwellings that the colonial builders achieved their greatest successes; and these works are quaint, charming, and refined, rather than impressive or imposing.

To the latter part of the colonial period belong a number of interesting buildings which remain as monuments of Spanish rule in California, Florida, and the Southwest. The old Fort S. Marco, now Fort Marion (1656-1756), and the Catholic cathedral (1793; after the fire of 1887 rebuilt in its original form with the original façade uninjured), both at St. Augustine, Fla.; the picturesque buildings of the California missions (mainly 1769-1800), the majority of them now in ruins; scattered Spanish churches in California, Arizona, and New Mexico, and a few unimportant secular buildings, display among their modern and American settings a picturesque and interesting Spanish aspect and character, though from the point of view of architectural detail they represent merely a crude phase of the Churrigueresque style.

+EARLY REPUBLICAN PERIOD.+ Between the Revolution and the War of 1812, under the new conditions of independence and self-government, architecture took on a more monumental character. Buildings for the State and National administrations were erected with the rapidly increasing resources of the country. Stone was more generally used; colonnades, domes, and cupolas or bell-towers, were adopted as indispensable features of civic architecture. In church-building the Wren-Gibbs type continued to prevail, but with greater correctness of classic forms. The gambrel roof tended to disappear from the houses of this period, and there was some decline in the refinement and delicacy of the details of architecture. The influence of the Louis XVI. style is traceable in many cases, as in the New York City Hall (1803-12, by _McComb_ and _Mangin_), one of the very best designs of the time, and in the delicate stucco-work and interior finish of many houses, The original +Capitol+ at Washington--the central portion of the present edifice--by _Thornton_, _Hallet_, and _B. H. Latrobe_ (1793-1830; Fig. 220), the +State House+ at Boston (1795, by _Bulfinch_), and the University of Virginia, at Charlotteville, by _Thomas Jefferson_ (1817; recently destroyed in part by fire), are the most interesting examples of the classic tendencies of this period. Their freedom from the rococo vulgarities generally prevalent at the time in Europe is noticeable.

+THE CLASSIC REVIVAL.+ The influence of the classic revivals of Europe began to appear before the close of this period, and reached its culmination about 1830-40. It left its impress most strongly on our Federal architecture, although it invaded domestic architecture, producing countless imitations, in brick and wooden houses, of Grecian colonnades and porticos. One of its first-fruits was the White House, or Executive Mansion, at Washington, by _Hoban_ (1792), recalling the large English country houses of the time. The +Treasury+ and +Patent Office+ buildings at Washington, the Philadelphia Mint, the +Sub-treasury+ and +Custom House+ at New York (the latter erected originally for a bank; Fig. 221), and the +Boston Custom House+ are among the important Federal buildings of this period. Several State capitols were also erected under the same influence; and the Marine Exchange and +Girard College+ at Philadelphia should also be mentioned as conspicuous examples of the pseudo-Greek style. The last-named building is a Corinthian dormitory, its tiers of small windows contrasting strangely with its white marble columns. These classic buildings were solidly and carefully constructed, but lacked the grace, cheerfulness, and appropriateness of earlier buildings. The Capitol at Washington was during this period greatly enlarged by terminal wings with fine Corinthian porticos, of Roman rather than Greek design. The +Dome+, by _Walters_, was not added until 1858-73; it is a successful and harmonious composition, nobly completing the building. Unfortunately, it is an afterthought, built of iron painted to simulate marble, the substructure being inadequate to support a dome of masonry. The Italian or Roman style which it exemplified, in time superseded the less tractable Greek style.

+THE WAR PERIOD.+ The period from 1850 to 1876 was one of intense political activity and rapid industrial progress. The former culminated in the terrible upheaval of the civil war; the latter in the completion of the Pacific Railroad (1869) and a remarkable development of the mining resources and manufactures of the country. It was a period of feverish commercial activity, but of artistic stagnation, and witnessed the erection of but few buildings of architectural importance. A number of State capitols, city halls and churches, of considerable size and cost but of inferior design, attest the decline of public taste and architectural skill during these years. The huge Municipal Building at Philadelphia and the still unfinished Capitol at Albany are full of errors of planning and detail which twenty-five years of elaboration have failed to correct. Next to the dome of the Capitol at Washington, completed during this period, of which it is the most signal architectural achievement, its most notable monument was the +St. Patrick’s Cathedral+ at New York, by _Renwick_; a Gothic church which, if somewhat cold and mechanical in detail, is a stately and well-considered design. Its west front and spires (completed 1886) are particularly successful. Trinity Church (1843, by _Upjohn_) and Grace Church (1840, by Renwick), though of earlier date, should be classed with this cathedral as worthy examples of modern Gothic design. Indeed, the churches designed in this style by a few thoroughly trained architects during this period are the most creditable and worthy among its lesser productions. In general an undiscriminating eclecticism of style prevailed, unregulated by sober taste or technical training. The Federal buildings by _Mullett_ were monuments of perverted design in a heavy and inartistic rendering of French Renaissance motives. The New York Post Office and the State, Army and Navy Department building at Washington are examples of this style.

+THE ARTISTIC AWAKENING.+ Between 1870 and 1880 a remarkable series of events exercised a powerful influence on the artistic life of the United States. Two terrible conflagrations in Chicago (1871) and Boston (1872) gave unexampled opportunities for architectural improvement and greatly stimulated the public interest in the art. The feverish and abnormal industrial activity which followed the war and the rapid growth of the parvenu spirit were checked by the disastrous “panic” of 1873. With the completion of the Pacific railways and the settlement of new communities in the West, industrial prosperity, when it returned, was established on a firmer basis. An extraordinary expansion of travel to Europe began to disseminate the seeds of artistic culture throughout the country. The successful establishment of schools of architecture in Boston (1866) and other cities, and the opening or enlargement of art museums in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Detroit, Milwaukee, and elsewhere, stimulated the artistic awakening which now manifested itself. In architecture the personal influence of two men, trained in the Paris École des Beaux-Arts, was especially felt--of _R. M. Hunt_ (1827-95) through his words and deeds quite as much as through his works; and of _H. H. Richardson_ (1828-86) predominantly through his works. These two men, with others of less fame but of high ideals and thorough culture, did much to elevate architecture as an art in the public esteem. To all these influences new force was added by the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia (1876). Here for the first time the American people were brought into contact, in their own land, with the products of European and Oriental art. It was to them an artistic revelation, whose results were prompt and far-reaching. Beginning first in the domain of industrial and decorative art, its stimulating influence rapidly extended to painting and architecture, and with permanent consequences. American students began to throng the centres of Old World art, while the setting of higher standards of artistic excellence at home, and the development of important art-industries, were other fruits of this artistic awakening. The recent Columbian Exhibition at Chicago (1893), its latest and most important manifestation, has added a new impulse to the movement, especially in architecture.

+STYLE IN RECENT ARCHITECTURE.+ The rapid increase in the number of American architects trained in Paris or under the indirect influence of the École des Beaux-Arts has been an important factor in recent architectural progress. Yet it has by no means imposed the French academic formulæ upon American architecture. The conditions, materials, and constructive processes here prevailing, and above all the eclecticism of the public taste, have prevented this. The French influence is perceived rather in a growing appreciation of monumental design in the planning, composition, and setting of buildings, than in any direct imitation of French models. The Gothic revival which prevailed more or less widely from 1840 to 1875, as already noticed, and of which the +State Capitol+ at Hartford (Conn.; 1875-78), and the +Fine Arts Museum+ at Boston, were among the last important products, was generally confined to church architecture, for which Gothic forms are still largely employed, as in the Protestant +Cathedral+ of +All Saints+ now building at Albany (N.Y.), by an English architect. For the most part the works of the last twenty years show a more or less judicious eclecticism, the choice of style being determined partly by the person and training of the designer, partly by the nature of the building. The powerfully conceived works of Richardson, in a free version of the French Romanesque, for a time exercised a wide influence, especially among the younger architects. +Trinity Church+, Boston (Fig. 222), his earliest important work; many public libraries and business buildings, and finally the impressive +County Buildings+ at Pittsburgh (Pa.), all treated in this style, are admirable rather for the strong individuality of their designer, displayed in their vigorous composition, than on account of the historic style he employed (Fig. 223). Yet it appeared in his hands so flexible and effective that it was widely imitated. But if easy to use, it is most difficult to use well; its forms are too massive for ordinary purposes, and in the hands of inferior designers it was so often travestied that it has now lost its wide popularity. While a number of able architects have continued to use it effectively in ecclesiastical, civic, and even commercial architecture, it is being generally superseded by various forms of the Renaissance. Here also a wide eclecticism prevails, the works of the same architect often varying from the gayest Francis I. designs in domestic architecture, or free adaptations of Quattrocento details for theatres and street architecture, to the most formal classicism in colossal exhibition-buildings, museums, libraries, and the like. Meanwhile there are many more or less successful ventures in other historic styles applied to public and private edifices. Underlying this apparent confusion, almost anarchy in the use of historic styles, the careful observer may detect certain tendencies crystallizing into definite form. New materials and methods of construction, increased attention to detail, a growing sense of monumental requirements, even the development of the elevator as a substitute for the grand staircase, are leaving their mark on the planning, the proportions, and the artistic composition of American buildings, irrespective of the styles used. The art is with us in a state of transition, and open to criticism in many respects; but it appears to be full of life and promise for the future.

+COMMERCIAL BUILDINGS.+ This class of edifices has in our great cities developed wholly new types, which have taken shape under four imperative influences. These are the demand for fire-proof construction, the demand for well-lighted offices, the introduction of elevators, and the concentration of business into limited areas, within which land has become inordinately costly. These causes have led to the erection of buildings of excessive height (Fig. 224); the more recent among them constructed with a framework of iron or steel columns and beams, the visible walls being a mere filling-in. To render a building of twenty stories attractive to the eye, especially when built on an irregular site, is a difficult problem, of which a wholly satisfactory solution has yet to be found. There have been, however, some notable achievements in this line, in most of which the principle has been clearly recognized that a lofty building should have a well-marked basement or pedestal and a somewhat ornate crowning portion or capital, the intervening stories serving as a die or shaft and being treated with comparative simplicity. The difficulties of scale and of handling one hundred and fifty to three hundred windows of uniform style have been surmounted with conspicuous skill (+American Surety Building+ and Broadway Chambers, New York; Ames Building, Boston; Carnegie Building, Pittsburgh; Union Trust, St. Louis). In some cases, especially in Chicago and the Middle West, the metallic framework is suggested by slender piers between the windows, rising uninterrupted from the basement to the top story. In others, especially in New York and the East, the walls are treated as in ordinary masonry buildings. The Chicago school is marked by a more utilitarian and unconventional treatment, with results which are often extremely bold and effective, but rarely as pleasing to the eye as those attained by the more conservative Eastern school. In the details of American office-buildings every variety of style is to be met with; but the Romanesque and the Renaissance, freely modified, predominate. The tendency towards two or three well-marked types in the external composition of these buildings, as above suggested, promises, however, the evolution of a style in which the historic origin of the details will be a secondary matter. Certain Chicago architects have developed an original treatment of architectural forms by exaggerating some of the structural lines, by suppressing the mouldings and more familiar historic forms, and by the free use of flat surface ornament. The Schiller, Auditorium, and Fisher Buildings, all at Chicago, Guaranty Building, Buffalo, and Majestic Building, Detroit, are examples of this personal style, which illustrates the untrammelled freedom of the art in a land without traditions.[27]

[Footnote 27: See Appendix, D and E.]

+DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE.+ It is in this field that the most characteristic and original phases of American architecture are to be met with, particularly in rural and suburban residences. In these the peculiar requirements of our varying climates and of American domestic life have been studied and in large measure met with great frankness and artistic appreciation. The broad staircase-hall, serving often as a sort of family sitting-room, the piazza, and a picturesque massing of steep roofs, have been the controlling factors in the evolution of two or three general types which appear in infinite variations. The material most used is wood, but this has had less influence in the determination of form than might have been expected. The artlessness of the planning, which is arranged to afford the maximum of convenience rather than to conform to any traditional type, has been the element of greatest artistic success. It has resulted in exteriors which are the natural outgrowth of the interior arrangements, frankly expressed, without affectation of style (Fig. 225). The resulting picturesqueness has, however, in many cases been treated as an end instead of an incidental result, and the affectation of picturesqueness has in such designs become as detrimental as any affectation of style. In the internal treatment of American houses there has also been a notable artistic advance, harmony of color and domestic comfort and luxury being sought after rather than monumental effects. A number of large city and country houses designed on a palatial scale have, however, given opportunity for a more elaborate architecture; notably the Vanderbilt, Villard, and Huntington residences at New York, the great country-seat of +Biltmore+, near Asheville (N.C.), in the Francis I. style (by R. M. Hunt), and many others.

+OTHER BUILDINGS.+ American architects have generally been less successful in public, administrative, and ecclesiastical architecture than in commercial and domestic work. The preference for small parish churches, treated as audience-rooms rather than as places of worship, has interfered with the development of noble types of church-buildings. Yet there are signs of improvement; and the new +Cathedral+ of +St. John the Divine+ at New York, in a modified Romanesque style, promises to be a worthy and monumental building. In semi-public architecture, such as hotels, theatres, clubs, and libraries, there are many notable examples of successful design. The +Ponce de Leon Hotel+ at St. Augustine, a sumptuous and imposing pile in a free version of the Spanish Plateresco; the Auditorium Theatre at Chicago, the Madison Square Garden and the Casino at New York, may be cited as excellent in general conception and well carried out in detail, externally and internally. The Century and Metropolitan Clubs at New York, the +Boston Public Library+, the Carnegie Library at Pittsburgh, the +Congressional Library+ at Washington, and the recently completed Minnesota +State Capitol+ at St. Paul, exemplify in varying degrees of excellence the increasing capacity of American architects for monumental design. This was further shown in the buildings of the +Columbian Exposition+ at Chicago in 1893. These, in spite of many faults of detail, constituted an aggregate of architectural splendor such as had never before been seen or been possible on this side the Atlantic. They further brought architecture into closer union with the allied arts and formed an object lesson in the value of appropriate landscape gardening as a setting to monumental structures.

It should be said, in conclusion, that with the advances of recent years in artistic design in the United States there has been at least as great improvement in scientific construction. The sham and flimsiness of the Civil War period are passing away, and solid and durable building is becoming more general throughout the country, but especially in the Northeast and in some of the great Western cities, notably in Chicago. In this onward movement the Federal buildings--post-offices, custom-houses, and other governmental edifices--have not, till lately, taken high rank. Although solidly and carefully constructed, those built during the period 1875-1895 were generally inferior to the best work produced by private enterprise, or by State and municipal governments. This was in large part due to enactments devolving upon the supervising architect at Washington the planning of all Federal buildings, as well as a burden of supervisory and clerical duties incompatible with the highest artistic results. Since 1898, however, a more enlightened policy has prevailed, and a number of notable designs for Federal buildings have been secured by carefully-conducted competitions.