Sex and Architecture: An Intersection in Chicago

Recently the public radio station WBEZ broadcast a feature on "Sex and Architecture." We thought that another approach should be considered.

I am not aware of any architect-designed structure in Chicago in which sex or sex appeal was the foremost intention of the architect. But there definitely are instances where sex and architecture cross paths or sex is an aspect of a larger architectural program or endeavor.

One place where Chicago architecture and sex intersect is the year 1856. It is the year when both Louis Sullivan, the father of the modern skyscraper, and Sigmund Freud, the father of modern psychology, were born. This linking may seem a little farfetched at first but there were a couple of important ideas that came out of Vienna and/or were widely popular there that are relevant to this question. These ideas can be helpful in or even fundamental to understanding Sullivan's work, its sensual aspects and create a thread that we carry down through the sartorial designs of Mies van der Rohe to the recent, rather puckish Prada Store and the new, slick Sofitel.

The first is the idea of the "heavy dress." The Viennese architect Gottfried Semper argued that since post and beam structural systems and the guts of every building were essentially the same, what the architect did was choose the style of its clothing or drape. The "heavy dress" is what differentiated one building from another. And "dress', a sexy dress, is a way to reveal and conceal, all the while leaving something to the imagination. The pedimental sculpture of the Parthenon from the 5th century BC in the British Museum speaks volumes on this. Having a little clothing on is much sexier than wearing nothing at all. The fabric hugs the figures' curves like a second skin inviting your caress (while strictly forbidden and not recommended, if you cannot control yourself make sure the Museum Guard isn't looking!). Its folds create shadow and rhythm, capturing your attention, without revealing too much. They still elicit a sensual response today.

The second idea is a dichotomy penned by Nietzsche that was very popular in fin de siecle Vienna. Nietzsche spoke of two fundamental opposites: the need to order or rationalize versus the need to embellish or ornate. This is played out in Sullivan's work -- much of his output is a structural frame that has been been embellished with ornament. Think of the overgrown, abundant foliage of his cast iron windows at Carson, Pirie, Scott, or his lush terracotta frames of the Krause Music Store on North Lincoln Avenue. Or think of Wright's description of his primary duty when hired by Sullivan as a draftsman of ornament -- first he drew the underlying geometry, say a circle and a rotated square, with a T-square and a compass and then he applied lush ornament calling it a crime. And, to put this into context, at that time so was everything in the bedroom but the missionary position with the lights on...

Nietzsche's aphorism "Without Art we perish from Truth" is instructive in describing the oeuvre of the architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Mies's output is arguably the non plus ultra of sensual 20th century architecture. This maybe hard to believe in Chicago but Mies' European work is known for its rich fabrics and sartorial finishes. When Mies came into his own in 1920's Berlin, there were 2 major movements in architecture: historicsm or those who made NeoGothic and Neoclassal buildings with traditional materials like marble and masonry attached to their steel frames in the manner of Gottfried Semper's "heavy dress" and Die Sachlichkeit or the New Objectivity. The latter used industrial methods and man-made materials to create inexpensive housing for the masses. Mies took the materials used by the historicists, the rich stones, sumptuous leathers, and the polished surfaces and combined them with the industrial methods and forms of the Die Neue Sachlichkeit to create what he saw as a third way in architecture.

Is Mies's work sexy? Yes, I think so, for all its transparency it uses light and reflection to change and slowly unfold the space. The best of the buildings elicit a response like that the architect himself had on Dr. Farnsworth at their first meeting: "The effect was tremendous, like a storm, a flood or other act of God." His interior spaces are legendary. They change with the time of day and the season. The shiny, reflective metals, the rich leathers, the tactile fabrics, the reflections from the glass radiate luxury and a Weimar noblesse and seductiveness. The polished metal curves of his Brno or Barcelona chairs have a sexiness about them. They beckon your touch. The one phrase that can be credited to him alone is "almost nothing." Like the Parthenon's pedimental sculpture, I think his interiors and their furnishings draw your attention and your touch but they don't reveal too much. They are pared down, but rich and they never reveal everything. The proportions are handsome and pleasing. The materials make them irresistible. (This is where his imitators and even some of his own American work goes awry.) His spaces are not earnest like the Die Neue Sachlichkeit; let's face it earnestness isn't sexy -- nice guys finish last. Nor are his buildings nostalgic like the Historicists; nostalgia, unless it's the
movie Henry and June, isn't sexy either. This brings me to the current situation in Chicago.

The Sofitel's sex appeal comes equally from its provocative shape (some say it's like a stiletto), reflective surfaces and displays of light. The mass is draped with white, frameless, backpainted glass that softly reflects its surroundings. The cone that it is cut out of the wedge, the primary building mass, creates a piazza, a place to be seen, that is as Parisian as the staircase in the Opera House. Like the Prada store's display of its fetish-like fashion, the Sofitel has its own display of beautiful people and objects. The waxed, designer automobiles drop off its Prada-wearing patrons in the piazza and those in the Café des Architectes can take notice. The revolving door is frameless glass and leads to a foyer whose floor radiates a changing rainbow of colored light through its glass cabochons. The foyer is separated from the grand staircase by a translucent glass partition that has a kaleidoscope projected on its surface from within. The materials are rich and lighting subdued. I think it is a sexy and/or glamourous experience. But its sex appeal is part of a branding strategy enacted by its French owners. So it has more in common with Ambercrombie and Fitch than it does with the directly sexual Museum of Sex in New York City or the phallic figures in Colonna's fifteenth century classic "Hypnerotomachia Poliphili." (The Newberry Library on Walton Street has a copy from the original printing.)

Sex appeal, like art, is an impossible thing to define but you can atleast create some concepts and categories in order to make some distinctions and then move forward.

What do you think?

Frank Gehry the Urban Planner

As you Bond, James Bond, fans will no doubt recall, the opening image of Pierce Brosnan's 1999 debut is a long lens shot of the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao -- an explosion of sunlit titanium framed at the end of a dark Spanish street.

Jump cut to Washington Street, Chicago -- we're about to get the same action picture from Gehry, Frank Gehry. The cladding is going onto the frame of the new Grant Park Bandshell.

Chicago has acquired a strong new image whose profile is dead centered on Washington Street and framed by the proscenium of the Wabash El. Thousands drive one-way east on Washington daily -- not one will miss it. (See arrow above.) Gehry's unmistakable forms are half the story and will get the press. But look closely at the pictures -- his skill at integrating the Bandshell into the Millennium Park site and Chicago's fabric is the other half.

It is very easy to forget that Mr. Gehry has an Urban Planning degree from Harvard. It is also easy to overlook that Urban Planning is something he takes very seriously and is exceedingly good at. It's easy to overlook because you are looking at the building's image, the setting recedes into the background.

Cross-fade to Bilbao, May 1991. Gehry's first meeting there with Guggenheim Director Thomas Krens was to consult on the site for the new museum. His analysis of the urban factors and city views in Bilbao lead away from an earlier site proposed by the Basque Government, to the present one on the Nervion River, adjacent to the Punte de la Salve. This site was much more exciting because diagonal views through the city connect it to Bilbao's arts centers, the Museo de Bellas Artes and its gardens to the west, and the Teatro Arriaga (Opera House) on the east, adjacent to Bilbao's governmental center. Across the river from this new site was the Universidad de Deusto -- together they would integrate the Guggenheim Bilbao into what Krens called the "geocultural triangle of Bilbao." Gehry's support of Krens helped convince their hosts to change the site. Coosje van Bruggen's book Guggenheim Museum Bilbao outlines the site selection process in detail. Two months later Gehry won the design competition, selected over Coop Himmeblau and Arata Isozaki.

Shortly after the Guggenheim Bilbao opened in 1998, members of the Pritzker family suggested to Mayor Richard M. Daley that the set piece of Millennium Park should be a new Grant Park Bandshell for its Outdoor Music Pavillion by their 1989 Pritzker Prize laureate. They backed it up with a $15 million gift from the Pritzker Foundation, and Chicago got its Gehry. The Millennium Park Project has stumbled several times since, but this month, as the first cladding goes up on the Bandshell, Gehry's skills in urban design are visible.

Seeing the Bandshell in profile on Washington tells us one important thing. Yes, it's on the grid. In Bilbao, Gehry used the radiating street pattern effectively, and in Chicago, he has used our grid to knit the Bandshell into the wider city. Locally, the Bandshell's profile is centered on the stairs that ascend from Michigan Avenue into the Park. In the same block across Michigan Avenue is the beloved Cultural Center, parallel to the Bandshell. They are both framed by Randolph Street on the north, and Washington on the south. To the west, the blocks between and adjacent to those two streets contain Chicago's Theater District, The Goodman Theater, Daley Plaza, Marshall Fields, and at LaSalle street, City Hall. Bordering the site to the south is the Art Institute, its primary facade on Michigan Avenue. The new wing by Renzo Piano will anchor the Columbus Drive corner. A pedestrian bridge by Piano connecting the two across Monroe Street was planned, but has been cancelled. (The fate of Gehry's wavy pedestrian bridge across Columbus to the east is unclear. Let us know what the situation is.)

The whole of the Bandshell and Outdoor Music Pavilion are framed between the neo-classical Peristyle at Randolph and Michigan and the Art Institute to the south. The sculpture of the Bandshell is very successful as the "free" element framed in a "classical" composition. Of course, the Peristyle was added to Millennium Park as it was redesigned over the past three years as economic times changed and more donors were brought on board. But all this has happened without moving the Bandshell or changing the Urban relationships of Gehry's design.

How will Chicagoans at large react? I hope for something like the response to the opening of the Thompson Center (State of Illinois Building), now for sale. Jahn's and Thompson's building, dramatically satirizing Chicago's machine politics, caused a furor that split the city into two camps: "It's incredibly great!" and "Who got paid off?" And, we will see if Gehry's Bandshell and Outdoor Music Pavilion will join our succession of iconic Chicago images, with John Hancock and Sears Tower, the Picasso, Marina Towers, the Wrigley Building, and the Tribune Building.

Our Predictions? Appears in print? one month. On television? two months. In a Bank One or Harris Bank commercial? 3 months. Dished by Blair Kamin? 4 months. In the next film set in Chicago? 18 months. Shot in Chicago? Who knows?

What do you think?