SOM's Lever House and Mies' Seagram Building

You can't visit New York as a Modern architectural buff and not visit Lever House and Seagram Building on Park Avenue. The two buildings glare at each other from separate sides of the street, the glass-clad Lever House dancing in its luminescent green gown while Seagram stands back with its moody black striations reaching for the sky.

Lever House was designed and built first, finishing in 1952. Gordon Bunshaft and a former neighbor of ours, Natalie de Blois, both of Skidmore, Owens, and Merrill (aka SOM) designed the structure. It was the second curtain-wall tower in New York City after the United Nations Secretariat Building, designed by a Oscar Niemeyer and Le Corbusier, also finished in 1952. Mies van der Rohe's vision of glass-clad, curtain walled towers influenced both of these buildings. The Seagram building finished construction in 1958 and represented a continuation of the architectural language Mies started with the Lakeshore Apartments in Chicago.

The Seagram building is infamous for its huge setback from the street, creating a massive plaza. Both buildings have plazas and enormous setbacks for the primary structure. This was governed in part by the desire to have purity of form (one giant rectangle) and by New York's sun-saving building code, which required growing setbacks as a structure grew taller. However, if the footprint of the main building occupied less than 25 percent of the property, growing setbacks were not required.

To the uneducated eye, both of these buildings look competent but somewhat humdrum. But at the time, almost all the structures in NYC and the world were masonry. These buildings were a radical departure that were fully embraced by subsequent architects, especially in the US. Today, almost all of out skyscrapers look like these two buildings.

By my eyes, Lever House is more reflective of its time, evoking the feel and materials of mid-century modern, whereas the Seagram Building feels timeless in its minimalism and materials. Ultimately, the outcome of this across-the-street architectural call and response was a victory for Mies. SOM subsequently aped Mies' style in future projects, becoming the Stone Temple Pilots to Mies' Pearl Jam. Standing on Park Avenue and turning your head side-to-side, you can see for yourself why.

What is Modern?

(photo from here)

Different experts define Modern differently. For some it’s an architectural style that existed back in the day and is no more. For others (myself included), it’s a more general movement that remains viable and active today and continues to evolve with new materials, new technology, and new living needs. The earliest innovators and adopters tended to rigidly define the new architecture with rigorously defended manifestos (at least until the manifestos became inconvenient and subsequently discarded, oftentimes by the manifesto writers themselves).

There are also various offshoots of Modern, including hybrids (Streamline Moderne, a fusion of Art Deco and Modern), Functionalism (supposedly no consideration of aesthetics), Googie (Modern gone wild), and the International Style. This last “offshoot” was conjured by Henry-Russell Hitchcock in his 1927 book, Modern Architecture: Romanticism and Reintegration and popularized after the 1932 Modern Architecture show at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Hitchcock noted that it really didn’t matter where a Modern building of that time was designed and built, it tended to look the same (flat roofs, flat surfaces, clean lines). Ironically, because photography back in those days was black and white, International Style also became synonymous with white structures, even though many of the buildings mentioned and exhibited in the 1932 show were not white. Many take the position that if a building is simply not white, it is not Modern. This creates endless entertainment when folks argue over whether a building is Modern or Contemporary.

Based on my readings, observations, and opinions, I’ve boiled Modern down to ten commandments: (1) lack of ornamentation, (2) form follows function, (3) honesty in materials and design, (4) embracing the environment, (5) eager adoption of new materials and technology, (6) a place for everything and everything in its place, (7) a focus on the human condition, (8) less is more, (9) use of the machine aesthetic, and (10) rules are meant to be broken.

Over the next several weeks I'll work my way down that list. Please jump in if you agree and/or disagree! Some answers are righter than other...

Commandment 1: Lack of Ornamentation
Commandment 2: Form Follows Function
Commandment 3: Honesty in Materials and Design
Commandment 4: Embracing the Environment
Commandment 5: Eager Adoption of New Materials and Technology
Commandment 6: A Place for Everything and Everything in Its Place
Commandment 7: A Focus on the Human Condition
Commandment 8: Less is More
Commandment 9: Use of the Machine Aesthetic
Commandment 10: Rules Are Meant to be Broken