#bunshaft

Gordon Bunshaft

Park Avenue is a nexus of Corporate Modernism with its sleek midcentury glass curtain wall towers. Lever House, designed by SOM’s Gordon Bunshaft and Natalie de Blois features the city's first building wrapped in a glass curtain wall. Built in 1952, the building was a divergence from previous office towers that were clad in masonry with setbacks as mandated in the 1916 zoning resolution. To construct a slab tower without setbacks, Lever House only occupied 25% of the site, leaving the remaining space open to the public. In 1958 Mies van der Rohe’s Seagram Building followed this form, occupying only 40% of the site with a grand public plaza, reflecting the post-war planning ideology of towers surrounded by open space. Generally regarded as the finest example of the International Style, Seagram would influence a generation of modernist mid-century skyscrapers. Three years later a major zoning resolution would incentivize this style by offering bonuses for public amenities like open space and regulating floor area, not mass. Above: Seagram Building, Lever House. Tap to purchase a fine-art print. #modernism #seagrambuilding #modernarchitecture #bunshaft #mies #miesvanderrohe #leverhouse #nyc #parkave #modernist #curtainwall #midcenturymodernism #moderndesign #midtown #nyc #archilovers #architecture #SOM #grandcentral #eastmidtown #rezoning #unioncarbide #270park #parkavenue #zoning #construction #skyscraper #skyscrapers #urban #urbanism (at Seagram Building) https://www.instagram.com/p/B5Gh6V5HSC3/?igshid=2wylught25sg

Connecticut General Life Insurance Company

Bunshaft x Noguchi . . . #vsco #architecture #beinecke #library #bunshaft #som #noguchi #bnw #bnwphotography # (at Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library)

© Ezra Stoller

OfHouses presents “Pritzkers’ First Houses, part IV”: Gordon Bunshaft (Pritzker 1998) designed only one house during his career. His own retreat in the Hamptons, a concrete structure with travertine walls, was home to Bunshaft’s extraordinary collection of modern art: Moore, Miro and Giacometti in the garden; Picasso, Dubuffet and Leger on the walls. Bunshaft left the house and the collection as a bequest to the MoMA. The museum kept the art, but the property was put on the market. Martha Stewart bought it and commissioned John Pawson to design an extension. The planned swimming pool and guest bedrooms were not completed, but the house and garden were left mutilated beyond recognition. The blocks of Italian travertine were halved and now adorn Martha’s kitchen... The house was finally demolished in 2005 by Donald Maharam, who bought the lot from Stewart. Asked why he didn’t tried to repair the existing structure, Maharam replied: "We bought a great piece of property. We didn't buy a house." (Photos: © Ezra Stoller/ESTO.)

#bunshaft #calder #felicidad (en Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library)

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