Louis Sullivan kept a copy of Gray's Manual of Botany and drew from its illustrations for the decorative ornament on his buildings.
The stunning entrance to the Carson, Pirie, Scott department store in Chicago draws on his knowledge of organic forms. Here, he also designed the Chicago Window, a large fixed pane of glass to let in light, flanked by two narrow sashes to let in air.
At the Wainwright Tomb at Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis, a series of geometric forms, Sullivan had craftsmen carve decorations into limestone. The brass doors are equally intricate.
The facade of the Merchant's National Bank in Grinnell, Iowa is a simple sqare with and elaborate, flat cornice; a large circular window, supported by columns, flanked by the Chicago Window. Like the tomb, the window is a series of geometric forms, carved in limestone.
Architectural historians credit Sullivan with the design of the first steel skyscraper, the Wainwright Building in St. Louis. Slender brick piers with elabrate capitals support an elaborate terra cotta frieze of botanical shapes, surrounding bull's eye windows, capped with a cornice, decorated in overlapping circles. Between the windows he added terra cotta spandrels. |
