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The Gilded Age not only saw extraordinary industrial growth, but the rise of an elite class defined by their conspicuous consumption. Monuments, municipal buildings, museums and mansions all became forms of telegraphing identity for "the 400," a term popularized by the NYT for the United States' wealthiest. Beaux-Arts classicism from Europe, French design ideals and neoclassical orders began filling New York City blocks, signifying a new era of architectural design on the continent.
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Born in Vermont but educated abroad, Richard Morris Hunt studied at the prestigious Parisian architectural school, the École des Beaux-Arts, studying classical orders, ancient structures and historicizing ornamentation. In 1856, he returned to the US, writing to his mother, "It has
been represented to me that America was not ready for
the Fine Arts, but I think they are mistaken. There is
no place in the world where they are more needed, or
where they should be more encouraged." -
With new wealth came the need for new expression. However, wealthy Americans looked to legitimize themselves by looking to the homes of the European aristocracy. Richard Morris Hunt's first commission, "a miniature fragment of a French chateau," shocked NYC. Alan Burnham writes, "In a city where millionaires had been content to live side by side in identical houses, the door had been opened upon a world in which rivalry was henceforth destined to manifest visibly in architecture." -
Louis Sullivan, a then-unknown architectural student of many American institutions (and briefly the École des Beaux-Arts), landed at the door of prominent Chicago designer Dankmar Adler in 1879. By the next year, he was made partner. Sullivan was fascinated by Gilded Age technological innovation, mainly developments in steel. As such, his partnership with Adler would produce some of the earliest -- and most sophisticated -- examples of steel-frame high rises and architecture in America. -
Away from the East Coast in Chicago, the 'newness' of the Gilded Age manifested differently. As a hub of industry and technological innovation, Chicago architects highlighted American ingenuity, not European classicism. Louis Sullivan became the figurehead of this movement after the completion of his first project, the Auditorium Building, which rejected ornamentation in favor of organic, streamlined forms and employed revolutionary acoustic technology, courtesy of his partner Dankmar Adler. -
These two contrasting approaches to large-scale design converged in 1893 at the Chicago World's Fair. Though Sullivan believed Chicago's architectural innovation would be on full display, fair organizer Daniel Burnham instead turned to Morris Hunt. Though Sullivan was commissioned for the striking and highly dramatized Transportation Building, Hunt's Beaux-Arts style reigned supreme at the fair. America had picked its vision of the City Beautiful, and it looked astonishingly like the past. -
After the Columbian Exposition, Richard Morris Hunt finalized his largest project yet: Biltmore Estate in Asheville, NC. Still the largest private home in America, Biltmore's Châteauesque façade contains 4 acres of floor space and 250 rooms. Though Hunt had designed many homes for the Vanderbilts, the sheer scope and grandeur of Biltmore illustrates the divergent trajectory of his and Sullivan's career after the World's Fair. Hunt was officially America's architect. -
The dominance of the Beaux-Arts style (solidified at the Exposition) and the economic recession of the 1890's spelled the end of Sullivan's architectural practice. However, the Guaranty/Prudential building in Buffalo, NY stands as not only one of his last completed projects, but one of his most influential. One of the earliest American skyscrapers, it typifies the disparate ethoses of Hunt and Sullivan, as well as their differing views of the future. -