Tag Archives: #DesignHistory

The Entrance to an Era: Chicago’s Metropolitan Tower (1924) and the Rise of Modern Michigan Avenue.    

Leave a reply

Feature Image: Main Entrance, Metropolitan Tower (1924), 310 South Michigan Avenue, Chicago, was designed by Graham, Anderson, Probst & White. December 2015. 4.89 mb DSC_0963 (1). Author’s photograph.

Metropolitan Tower’s main entrance is more than an architectural detail: it is a surviving gateway to one of Chicago’s most significant early skyscrapers, a building that embodied the ambitions, craftsmanship, and corporate prestige of the 1920s while reflecting the evolution of Michigan Avenue and modern Chicago.

Located at 310 South Michigan Avenue on the southwest corner of Jackson Boulevard, Metropolitan Tower originally served as corporate headquarters for S.W. Straus and Co., a banking and investment firm. The building was erected in 1924 by Graham, Anderson, Probst & White in their signature classical style. The architectural firm was one of the largest in the first half of the twentieth century and went on to build Chicago’s Civic Opera Building in 1929. Founded in 1912, the firm was the successor to D. H. Burnham & Co. by way of partner, Ernest R. Graham (1868-1936), and Burnham’s sons, Hubert and Daniel Jr. Five years later the Burnhams left to form their own firm (Burnham Brothers) and Graham partnered with others of the firm’s members: William Peirce Anderson (1870-1924), Edward Mathias Probst (1870-1942), and Howard Judson White (1870-1936). No expense was spared for the Straus Building’s interior, though of the original lobby’s opulence all that remains are the elaborate bronze elevator doors. The entrance’s coffered bronze doors by Italian sculptor Leo Lentelli (1879-1961) were destroyed. see – Saliga, Pauline A., editor, The Sky’s The Limit A Century of Chicago Skyscrapers, Rizzoli New York, 1990, p. 117.

The Metropolitan Tower was built in 1924 as the headquarters of S.W. Straus & Co. and designed by Graham, Anderson, Probst & White, successors to the Burnham architectural tradition.

Ernest R. Graham (1868-1936).

William Peirce Anderson (1870-1924).

Edward Mathias Probst (1870-1942).

Howard Judson White (1870-1936).

The elaborate entrance and lobby originally featured exceptional decorative work, including bronze doors created by sculptor Leo Lentelli, although many original elements have been lost.

Leo Lentelli (1879-1961). The Italian sculptor created the original main entrance doors for Metropolitan Tower that were later destroyed. Public Domain.

The 30-floor classical-style Straus Building was renamed over the years for other of its famous inhabitants including Continental National Insurance Co. and Britannica Center for Encyclopedia Britannica. Metropolitan Tower was the first building in Chicago that took advantage of the new 1923 zoning ordinance for skyscrapers that allowed buildings taller than 260 feet (30 or more floors) with the necessary setbacks. Metropolitan Tower’s required setbacks begin at the 21st floor on which sits a nine-story tower until there is a second setback and then the final two stories. Crowned by a stepped pyramid and possessed of a powerful beacon that opened in 1924, the building is Chicago’s first Michigan Avenue skyscraper.

Metropolitan Tower was the first skyscraper on Michigan Avenue and one of the earliest buildings to take advantage of Chicago’s new 1923 zoning regulations permitting greater height through setbacks. Its distinctive stepped crown, beacon, and symbolic ornamentation made it a recognizable feature of the Chicago skyline.

Built in 1924, Metropolitan Tower was Michigan Avenue’s first skyscraper. PHOTO: “Metropolitan Tower, Chicago in May 2016” by MusikAnimal is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Unused for years, the building’s 1,500-pound carillon bells were restored in 1979 for Pope John Paul II’s visit to Chicago. Just steps from Metropolitan Tower, the papal visit included an outdoor mass in Grant Park on October 5, 1979, which attracted over one million attendees, the largest gathering ever in Grant Park history up to that time. see – CBS Chicago Vault: Pope John Paul II enthralls Chicagoans on 1979 visit – CBS Chicago – retrieved March 18, 2026.

At one time, the thirtieth floor was the Straus Tower Observatory, which was open to the public for viewing the city in all four directions. see – Home | Metropolitan Tower – retrieved February 24, 2026. Home to the Continental National Insurance Company soon after it was built, this iconic skyscraper is located within Chicago’s Landmark Historic Michigan Boulevard District. The glass “beehive” supported by four bison figures at the top of the building held the blue light of a four-direction beacon. The ensemble, symbolizing industry, strength, and thrift, saw its beacon, signifying global reach, permanently shut down in 1934 following the financial failure of the S.W. Straus and Company during the Great Depression. The building was converted to residential condominiums in 2007. see – Metropolitan Tower | Powered by Baird & Warner– retrieved February 24, 2026; AIA Guide to Chicago, 2nd Edition, Alice Sinkevitch, Harcourt, Inc., Orlando, 2004, page 42.

The building was constructed in a classical style and represented the high quality and prestige associated with major Chicago commercial architecture of the 1920s. Over time, the building adapted to changing uses and occupants, including Encyclopedia Britannica and residential condominiums, demonstrating its continued relevance and preservation.

A Jazz-Age Flapper Bride: The 1924 Noling-Anderson Wedding in Evanston, Illinois.

Leave a reply

Feature Image: On Saturday, June 7, 1924, Ruth M. Anderson was married in this sleeveless wedding dress (left) to William Noling in Evanston, Illinois. The dress is now on display in the Charles Gates Dawes House in Evanston. Dawes was Vice President of the United States from 1925 to 1929 under President Calvin Coolidge. Author’s photograph (October 2015).

A surviving wedding dress and family home transform a local 1924 wedding into a study of popular culture, showing how the artistic styles and fashions of the Jazz Age reshaped American attitudes toward femininity, modernity, and social convention.

Wedding at the House of the Bride’s family

The Noling-Anderson wedding was held in the house of the bride and her parents, Isak and Jennie (née Johnson) Anderson, at 1035 Ridge Avenue in Evanston. Built in 1914, the house still stands as it did over 100 years ago.

Noling-Anderson Bridal Party Dresses, 1924 in the Charles Gates Dawes House, Evanston, Illinois. October 2015. Author’s photograph. 7.44 mb DSC_0893 (1)

The dress is made of silk satin in an egg shell color. It is accented by an oval medallion with bands also made of silk satin. The medallion is embroidered with faux pearl and other glass beads.

Thoroughly modern flapper style

While her wedding dress was very fashionable for the mid1920’s – sleeveless tops of all shapes and sizes were the rage in 1924 – it probably was not allowed in one of Evanston’s houses of worship. The fact that it was sleeveless and au courant would be deemed by many as risqué for showing too much bare skin inspired by a thoroughly modern flapper style. It was only in 1924, for instance, that the Methodist Episcopal General Conference first lifted its ban on going to the theater as well as dancing though dance music was the radio’s most popular programming.

The bridesmaid dress (right) was the height of women’s style in 1924 – a mainly straight, knee-length skirt gathered slightly or cut with front pleats. Short sleeve and sleeveless tops were the rage in 1924 reflected in Hollywood by the Mack Sennett girls who starred in movies where they pranced on the beach in a chorus line in not much more than bathing caps and short swim suits.

The fashionable bride and her court might have sported the latest style of facial make-up which is hinted at in the display– masklike with garish, even orange, lipstick and heavy red rouge on the cheeks. Popular fashion accessories from 1924 are also evident – pearls knotted at the neck and simple, though elegant, arm bracelets.

Father of the bride was an Evanston banker, local businessman, and Swedish immigrant

The bride’s father, Isak Anderson, was born in Sweden and came to the United States at 20 years old in 1890. In 1891 he married Jennie Johnson and they had Ruth and another child. Ruth’s father was a bank director and partner in a local tailoring business in downtown Evanston at 608 Davis that today is a noodle shop.  

The Jazz Age transformed American social customs, fashion, and ideas of modern womanhood, with the bride’s flapper-inspired wedding attire reflecting broader cultural shifts that were fashionable, controversial, and distinctly of their time.

The dance migrated North during the Great Migration. It officially exploded into mainstream American culture on October 29, 1923, when it debuted on Broadway in the all-Black musical revue Runnin’ Wild. The show featured the hit song “The Charleston,” composed by jazz pioneer James P. Johnson, which provided the fast, syncopated 4/4 rhythm that defined the dance. The Charleston was most fashionable during the “Roaring Twenties” (1923–1929), reaching its absolute peak popularity between 1926 and 1927.

It was most popular in major urban centers—particularly New York City, Chicago, Paris and London, where young women called flappers wore short dresses, rolled down their stockings, and kicked up their heels to flout traditional social etiquette

The original Charleston craze effectively ended as a mainstream fad with the onset of the Great Depression in 1929. However, it didn’t completely disappear. The Charleston’s fast kicks, hand-to-knee swivels, and loose movements were absorbed into newer, more complex swing dances, most notably, for the Lindy Hop and the Jitterbug in the 1930s and 1940s.

They served “Prohibition highballs”

With Prohibition starting in 1920, guests at the wedding may have been served the latest popular highball whose recipe called for fruit juice and raw eggs. Their morning might have started with a bowl of Wheaties at breakfast, since the cereal of champions made its first appearance in 1924.

Wearing that dress Ruth Anderson married William Noling in this house at 1035 Ridge Avenue in Evanston, Illinois, on June 7, 1924. May 2024. Author’s photograph. 92% 7.81 mb

The bride’s attire reflected contemporary flapper fashion, including higher hemlines and sleeveless styles.

SOURCES: Charles G. Dawes House. Evanston, Illinois.
Ernst Wilhelm Olson, The Swedish Element in Illinois: Survey of the Past Seven Decades (Chicago: Peter-Albin-Publishing, 1917), p. 586.
Lois Gordon and Alan Gordon, American Chronicle (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999), pp. 230–38.
Thomas G. Aylesworth and Virginia Aylesworth, Chicago: The Glamour Years (1919-1941) (New York: Gallery Books, 1986), p. 14.

Architecture for a Universal Faith: Louis Bourgeois and the Baháʼí Temple (1912-1953) in Wilmette, Illinois.

Leave a reply

FEATURE image: Architect Louis Bourgeois incorporated a variety of religious architecture and symbols including for Hindus, Buddhists, Native Americans, Jews, Christians and Muslims, to convey the Baháʼí principle of the unity of religion. Author’s photograph.

The Baháʼí Temple in Wilmette is one of America’s most distinctive religious monuments, where architect Louis Bourgeois fused spiritual ideals, innovative design, and intricate ornament into a landmark that took more than forty years to complete and remains a singular achievement in twentieth-century sacred architecture.

Text & Photographs by John P. Walsh.

The temple was designed by French-Canadian architect Louis Bourgeois (1856–1930). By 1906 Bourgeois and his wife joined the Baháʼí faith. Photo c. 1922. Public Domain.

The Chicago Baháʼí Temple House of Worship is the second such house of worship constructed and the oldest one that is still standing. The popular destination along Lake Michigan on Chicago’s Northshore attracts visitors from around the world today for its amazing architecture, beautiful gardens, and message of religious unity in prayer and for peace.

The temple was designed by French-Canadian architect Louis Bourgeois (1856–1930). After studying and traveling in Paris, Italy, Greece, Egypt, and Iran, Bourgeois settled in Chicago in 1896 where he worked with Louis Sullivan. Bourgeois moved to Southern California and, in 1898, designed in Hollywood a landmark Mission Revival style house for painter Paul de Longpré (1855-1911) whose architecture and gardens became a tourist attraction.

The building serves as the North American Baháʼí House of Worship. Located in Wilmette, Illinois, it has become one of Chicagoland’s most recognizable landmarks.

The nine sides of the building represent the largest single digit number which stands for the Baháʼí belief in the unity and oneness of humankind. June 2014. Author’s photograph. 6.55mb

The idea for the construction of the first Baháʼí Temple in the Western world began in Chicago in 1903. When there was a call for designs, Louis Bourgeois’ plans were the most promising. He worked on the complex design from 1909 to 1917. Before that time, Louis Bourgeois and his wife had joined the Baháʼí faith after having come into association with the Baha’i Faith through Boston’s Baháʼí community. In that time Bourgeois constructed a plaster model of his completed vision and in the 1920’s until his death in 1930 worked on the temple’s construction in Wilmette, Illinois.

While building activity was delayed though the Great Depression of the 1930’s and into World War II, temple construction began again in earnest in 1947 and the temple was dedicated in 1953.

Designed by French-Canadian architect Louis Bourgeois, its more than 40-year construction history reflects the determination of the Baháʼí community to realize Bourgeois’s ambitious vision.

Abdu’l-Bahá (1844-1921), eldest son of Baháʼu’lláh (1817-1892), the founder of the Baháʼí Faith, participated in the ground-breaking ceremony in 1912 of Baháʼí Temple. Construction began in earnest in the 1920s. It is four stories of reinforced concrete. June 2014. Author’s photograph. 4.11mb

Baháʼu’lláh (1817-1892) was an Iranian religious leader who founded the Baháʼí Faith. Public Domain.

Money for the building was raised entirely by the temple congregants as their gift to the people of the world. June 2014. Author’s photograph. 6.30mb

The temple blends influences from Gothic, Islamic, Byzantine, Renaissance, and other world architectural traditions into a unified design. Its lace-like concrete ornamentation creates one of the most elaborate exterior surfaces in American architecture.

The temple rises 191 feet from its base to its ribbed dome’s peak. The main story pylons are 45 feet high each. The building’s surfaces are teeming with carved lacelike ornamentation. June 2013. Author’s photograph. 4.50mb

The Baháʼí Temple has a highly traditional appearance whose architectural reputation—in an age of orthodox modernism and postmodernism—has grown only more positive with the years. June 2013. Author’s photograph. 4.85 mb

Interior of the auditorium inside the Baháʼí House of Worship in Wilmette, Illinois. The entire surface—from the towering walls to the massive dome ceiling—is covered in highly detailed, openwork ornamental lattice patterns that filter natural light.

  • The Grand Dome: A central, monumental circular dome rises high above the space, featuring a gilded calligraphic emblem at its center. Molded seamlessly into the pillars and lace-like quartz masonry are major global religious symbols layered chronologically from bottom to top—including Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and Hinduism—symbolizing the fraternity and evolution of mankind.
  • Soaring Arches and Pillars: Nine main pillars and towering arched window bays flank the multi-layered walls, drawing the eye upward. The number nine is the highest single-digit number, mathematically representing oneness, perfection, and the ultimate completion of God’s revelation.
  • Concentric Seating Layout: Curved rows of rich, red velvet-cushioned wooden seating wrap around a highly polished, reflective floor that mirrors the warm lighting from above.
    PHOTO: “The forbidden temple.” by kern.justin is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

The room is strictly dedicated to prayer, quiet contemplation, and meditation.  There are no sermons, rigid ritualism, or set religious dogmas permitted here. Because the faith emphasizes that all major world religions originate from the same Creator, the devotional readings regularly feature sacred scriptures from different faiths. In alignment with Baháʼí principles, the room features no professional clergy, religious imagery, or musical instruments. Any music performed during devotionals comes strictly from a cappella choirs or soloists.

The temple occupies a unique place in American religious architecture because it is unlike any traditional church, synagogue, mosque, or cathedral.

The temple’s main prayer room seats 1,200 people. In the Baháʼí faith there are no clergy, no sermons and no rituals. Scriptures are read from many different faith traditions and music by soloists or a cappella choir. June 2013. Author’s photograph. 5.31mb

The Baha’i House of Worship Choir, under the direction of Van Gilmer, performs “This is the Day”—featuring words by Báha’u’lláh and arranged by Stanford E. Scriven—at the 17th Annual Choral Festival in Wilmette, Illinois.

“The Source of All Learning is the Knowledge of God – Exalted Be His Glory.” There are an equal number of entrances each with a quotation above it by Baháʼu’lláh  (1817-1892), founder of the Baháʼí faith. June 2013. Author’s photograph. 5.94mb

The Baháʼí temple is open year-round presenting its unique beauty through the seasons. February 2021. Author’s photograph.7.97mb

The nine-sided plan reflects Baháʼí religious symbolism and the principle of unity. The structure demonstrates how architecture can express universal spiritual ideals through light, geometry, and decoration.

The building is on the National Register of Historic Places and situated on a broad, landscaped site that looks towards Lake Michigan. PHOTO: “Wilmette, 2015” by gregorywass is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.

SOURCES:

Chicago Churches and Synagogues: An Architectural Pilgrimage, George Lane, S.J., and Algimantas Kezys, Loyola University Press, Chicago, 1981, pp. 160-161.

Chicago’s Famous Buildings, Fifth Edition, Franz Schulze and Kevin Harrington, Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 2003, pp. 267-269.

A Guide to Chicago’s Historic Suburbs on Wheels and on Foot, Ira J. Bach, Swallow Press/Ohio University Press, 1981, p. 535.

The Civic Opera Building (1929): Samuel Insull’s Art Deco Monument to Music and Commerce on the Chicago River.

Leave a reply

FEATURE image: CIVIC OPERA BUILDING, 20 N. Wacker Drive, Chicago. The world-famous Lyric Opera of Chicago mounts its productions in one of North America’s most beautiful opera houses, the Civic Opera House at 20 North Wacker Drive in downtown Chicago, Illinois. Author’s photograph.

The Civic Opera Building (1929) represents one of Chicago’s greatest achievements of the skyscraper era, combining world-class commercial office space with a grand opera house in a monumental Art Deco landmark that symbolized the city’s cultural and economic confidence at the end of the Roaring Twenties.

Samuel Insull was the founder of Commonwealth Edison Company in Chicago. The
Great Depression had a devastating effect on Insull’s utilities and transportation empire, due to what became an overly leveraged financial position of his main holding company (by one accounting Insull had less than a 1% cash stake). Insull’s fortunes as well as his shareholders’ were in ruins overnight and Insull quickly became a despised figure. Born in the U.K., Insull became a U.S. citizen in 1896 and now fled to France and then Greece. In October 1932 Insull was brought up on charges in the U.S. of financial malfeasance – bankruptcy, embezzlement, and using the mails to defraud investors. When he was returned to the U.S. to stand trial Insull was defended by Chicago criminal lawyer and former Illinois Supreme Court justice Floyd E. Thompson (1887-1960) and found not guilty on all counts. Insull ended his days living in Paris on a small pension from his business interests. On July 16, 1938, in the summer heat, 78-year-old Insull died of a heart attack after descending the stairs accompanied by his wife into the Place de la Concorde Métro station. Insull was buried in London eight days later. The once-populist multi-millionaire dubbed the “Prince of Electricity” who had been president of 11 power and transportation companies and sat on 65 boards was, at his death, worse than broke. According to his 1932 will, Insull held $1,000 in assets and $14,000,000 in debts. See – “Fortune Shrank to $1,000, Samuel Insull Will Shows”. Reading Eagle. 12 August 1938 – retrieved June 29, 2024 and https://www.chicago-l.org/figures/insull/ – retrieved June 29, 2024.

Graham, Anderson, Probst & White was one of the largest architectural firms in the first half of the twentieth century. Founded in 1912, the firm was the successor to D. H. Burnham & Co. by way of partner, Ernest R. Graham (1868-1936), and Burnham’s sons, Hubert and Daniel Jr. Five years later the Burnhams left to form their own firm (Burnham Brothers) and Graham partnered with others of the firm’s members: William Peirce Anderson (1870-1924), Edward Mathias Probst (1870-1942), and Howard Judson White (1870-1936). Pediment sculpture by Henry Hering (1874-1949).

Ernest R. Graham (1868-1936)
William Peirce Anderson (1870-1924)
Edward Mathias Probst (1870-1942)
Howard Judson White (1870-1936)

Conceived by opera impresario Samuel Insull and designed by Graham, Anderson, Probst & White, the Civic Opera Building fused architecture, business, and the performing arts into one of the most distinctive and influential skyscrapers on the Chicago River.

Plan of Chicago Authors:

The Burnham Plan, co-authored by Daniel H. Burnham (1846-1912) and Edward H. Bennett (1874-1954) and published in 1909 encouraged making the Chicago River a focal point of building development. By 1929 massive projects including the Merchandise Mart, Chicago Daily News Building (2 N. Riverside Plaza) and Civic Opera Building (above) stood along the intersection of the three branches of the Chicago River that was part of the plan.

Daniel Hudson Burnham, c. 1890. Burnham was a great collaborator and invited architect Edward Bennett to move to Chicago to collaborate on the comprehensive plan for San Francisco, and afterwards, the Plan of Chicago. While Burnham raised money and visibility for the Chicago Plan, Bennett created the actual layouts and drawings which are so well known today. Public Domain.

The architect Edward Herbert Bennett (1874–1954) is best known as the co-author (with Daniel H. Burnham) of the Plan of Chicago, published in 1909. Bennett moved to Chicago from New York City in 1903 when he was 29 years old. Public Domain.

The Civic Opera Building is an office building wrapped around its theatres including a 3,563-seat opera house. It is the second-largest opera auditorium in North America after the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City. in 1996 the interior was named The Ardis Krainik Theatre in honor of Ardis Joan Krainik (1929-1997), an American mezzo-soprano opera singer and the former General Director for 15 years, who was responsible for its renovation after 1993.

The Ardis Krainik Theatre in the Civic Opera Building has 3,563 seats and is the second-largest opera auditorium in North America. PHOTO: “Civic Opera House, Chicago” by notmargaret is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Chicago opera companies have included the Chicago Grand Opera Company (1910-1914), Chicago Opera Association (1915-1921), Chicago Civic Opera (1922-1932), Chicago Grand Opera Company (1933-1935), Chicago City Opera (1935-1939), Chicago Opera Company (1940-1946), Lyric Theatre (1954-1955), Lyric Opera of Chicago (1956-). see – https://chicagology.com/opera/chicagooperahistory/ – retrieved September 20, 2024.

The opera house remains one of North America’s largest performance venues.

Masks of Comedy and Tragedy and motifs of music (lyre and trumpet) and poetry (palm leaf and laurel leaf) which appear in terra cotta on the exterior of the building are repeated in the auditorium. Jules Guérin (1966-1946) known for his watercolors of the Plan of Chicago and murals for other skyscrapers supervised the interior design. PHOTO: “Civic Opera House (Chicago)” by Jeffrey Beall is licensed under CC BY 4.0.

Jules Guérin (1866-1946) in 1898. The artist was born in St Louis, Missouri and with his family moved to Chicago in 1880. The American muralist and interior designer was educated at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and gained prominence for his architectural work such as his paintings for the Plan for Chicago in 1906. Guérin was noted for the large murals he painted for famous public structures such as for the Lincoln Memorial In Washington, D.C. For the Civic Opera Building Guérin supervised interior design. Public Domain.

Chicago. Civic Opera House (1929). The east elevation facing North Wacker Drive presents a long and enormous covered colonnade. May 2014. Author’s photograph. 2.79 mb

The Civic Opera House main auditorium seats 3,563 and is the second largest opera house in the country after New York City’s Metropolitan Opera House that seats 3,850. August 2021. Author’s photograph. 7.94 mb_9304 (1).

The impressive building and its ornamentation was the result of British-born business magnate and Chicago financier Samuel Insull (1859-1938) who was inspired by the concept of the Auditorium Building with its theatres and offices in a skyscraper-sized building designed by Adler & Sullivan in 1889 at 430 S. Michigan Avenue. Insull, the president of the Chicago Civic Opera Association, wanted to erect the new opera house as the new permanent home of the Chicago Civic Opera. The building itself is shaped like a chair and nicknamed “Insull’s Throne.”

Famous for its massing, often compared to a gigantic armchair facing west.

Civic Opera Building under construction in Chicago in 1928. Civic Opera Building under construction in Chicago in 1928. Public Domain.

The Art Deco/Classical building’s ambition is multi-faceted – an opera house, a smaller theater, and enough office space to fill a skyscraper. The theatres are surmounted by a central tower 45 stories high flanked by two wings with the west elevation facing the Chicago River resembling a throne. August 2024. Author’s photograph. 77% 7.81mb_1566.

Floyd E. Thompson was an Illinois lawyer and newspaper publisher who became an Illinois Supreme Court justice (term, 1919-1928) who defended Samuel Insull on charges of financial malfeasance in the 1930’s in a case that returned a verdict of “not guilty” on all counts.

Civic Opera Building’s west elevation faces the Chicago River. August 2024. Author’s photograph. 5.11 mb _1562 (1).

Civic Opera Building under construction, 1927. Public Domain.

The 1929 building occupies a block bounded by W. Madison Street (above), N. Wacker Drive, W. Washington Street and N. Wacker Drive. August 2021. Author’s photograph.99% 7.89 mb_9300.

The Civic Opera building’s Classical window casement is evident facing west at the Chicago River. The building rises 555 feet on hardpan caissons, a soil layer above bedrock. August 2024. Author’s photograph. 87% 7.90mb_1560 (1).

SOURCES:

AIA Guide to Chicago, 2nd Edition, Alice Sinkevitch, Harcourt, Inc., Orlando, 2004, pages 14 and 90.

Chicago’s Famous Buildings, 5th Edition, Franze Schulze and Kevin Harrington, The University of Chicago Press, 2003, pp. 117-118.

History of Development of Building Construction in Chicago, Second Edition, Frank A. Randall, Revised and Expanded by John D. Randall, University of Illinois Press, Urbana and Chicago, 1999, p. 330-331.

Saliga, Pauline A., editor, The Sky’s The Limit A Century of Chicago Skyscrapers, Rizzoli New York, 1990, p. 152-153.

FURTHER READING: Forty Years of Opera in Chicago, Edward C. Moore, 1930.

Opera in Chicago, Ronald Davis, 1966.

S. Charles Lee’s Loma Theatre (1945): A Bridge Between Art Deco Glamour and Postwar Modernism in San Diego.

Leave a reply

FEATURE image: The Loma Theatre with its vertical sign in San Diego, California. was opened in 1945. This is a true transitional/hybrid building for American architect S. Charles Lee. The architect retains the curves (in the sign) of his pre-war theatre buildings and moves to the angles (in the main structure) that increasingly marked his movie theatres post war. The Loma Theatre was built in the later part of Lee’s career and is one of the scores of movie theatres built by the architect between 1926 and 1950. It was operated by Mann Theatres from 1973 until it closed on December 17, 1987. In San Diego’s Midway District, the Loma Theatre had a reputation of being a friendly, classy place (see video below). Author’s photograph, October 1999 60%.

The Loma Theatre is more than a surviving neighborhood movie house; it is a significant example of architect S. Charles Lee’s late-career design evolution, reflecting the transition from the streamlined curves of prewar theater architecture to the sharper modern forms of the postwar era.

The Loma Theatre was designed by S. Charles Lee (1899-1990) and opened on May 5, 1945 with its first feature, 20th Century-Fox’s Technicolor musical film, Diamond Horseshoe, starring Betty Grable. While the year 1936 was the most prolific year for Lee’s building designs – no less than 32 individual structures in California – the years 1945-46 of which the Loma Theatre is a part were prolific with 17 new movie theatres erected in California as well as one each in Arizona (250 seats), Miami, Florida (2000 seats), and Managua, Nicaragua (2000 seats). The Loma Theatre was originally opened with 1,188 seats.

Betty Grable was a 1940’s musical star. The Loma Theatre opened their doors with “Diamond Horseshoe,” a Technicolor Fox musical that was very successful at its release. PHOTO: “Betty Grable, 1940s musical star” by Movie-Fan is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0.

S. Charles Lee was one of the foremost mid20th-century architects of movie houses on the West Coast. Simeon Charles Levi was born and grew up in Chicago. There Lee worked for Rapp & Rapp, the renowned Chicago architectural firm that specialized in movie theatre design. Rapp & Rapp’s significant work in this period included State Street’s Chicago Theatre in 1921, and the Bismarck Hotel and Theatre, and the Oriental Theatre both in 1926.

Born in Chicago, S. Charles Lee went on to become one of California’s most prolific and successful movie palace architects. Lee was also an avid pilot, routinely taking to the skies to slash travel times between coastal construction sites—a high-flying corporate strategy that never failed to leave a lasting impression on his elite clientele.

Architect S. Charles Lee in the early 1920s. Public Domain.

The Loma Theatre’s architect was influenced by Louis Sullivan (1856-1924) and Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959). In 1922, before moving to Los Angeles, Lee was impressed by the Chicago Tribune building competition on North Michigan Avenue whose competitors juxtaposed historicism, such as the Beaux-Arts, with modernism. Lee considered himself a modernist, and his design career expressed the Beaux-Arts discipline and a modernist functionalism and freedom of form.

Lee was influenced by Louis Sullivan, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Chicago modernism, blending Beaux-Arts discipline with modernist functionalism.

The Loma Theatre served as a popular community cinema for decades and remains notable today for retaining its iconic vertical sign and some original theater elements. The building’s later reuse as a bookstore demonstrates how historic theaters can survive beyond their original purpose. October 1999. Author’s photograph.

Beginning his career in California in the 1920’s, by the 1930’s S. Charles Lee was the principal designer of motion picture theaters in Los Angeles. Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, Lee is credited with designing many hundreds of movie theaters in California, including San Diego’s Loma Theatre at 3150 Rosecrans Boulevard.

Mann Theatres operated it from 1973 to December 1987. Its last feature was Paramount Pictures’ Fatal Attraction, starring Michael Douglas and Glenn Close. The Loma ’s vintage signage is intact along with some of its movie-house interior although today it serves as a bookstore. For other interesting memories of this friendly and classy movie house, see – http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/1716– retrieved December 29, 2022.

During the 1930s and 1940s, Lee designed hundreds of theaters, helping shape the visual identity of moviegoing in California.

The Loma Theatre occupies a distinctive place in both California and American movie-theater history. Designed by S. Charles Lee, the architect most closely associated with California’s golden age of movie-house construction, it reflects a moment when the exuberant curves of Art Deco and Streamline Moderne were giving way to the cleaner forms of postwar modernism. As one of the many theaters Lee designed across the West, the Loma brought Hollywood’s latest productions to a neighborhood audience while sharing in the architectural vision that transformed moviegoing into a national cultural experience. Its survival today, crowned by its iconic vertical sign, makes it not only a cherished San Diego landmark but also a tangible reminder of an era when distinctive theaters stood at the center of American community life.