Auditorium Building

The Auditorium Building ( Auditorium Building) in Chicago is one of the most famous works of the architects Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan. The building is located near the Grant Park in the southern inner city.

The Auditorium Theatre is part of the building was the first performance venue of the Municipal Opera of Chicago and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Today, the Auditorium Building is the headquarters of the private Roosevelt University. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1975. In addition, it has been one of 16 September 1976, the official emblem of the city (Chicago Landmark ). It is part of the historic district Michigan Boulevard.

Planning

The businessman Ferdinand Peck made ​​in December 1886 to enter the Chicago Auditorium Association as a corporation. His goal was to be competitive with the audience over large theaters such as the Metropolitan Opera House in New York. Peck should have tried to make the Chicago working class to the upscale cultural events more accessible.

The building included an office area and a luxury hotel. Ferdinand Peck persuaded many magnates from the business world of Chicago for his cause. These included, among others, Marshall Field, Edson Keith, Martin Ryerson and George Pullman. The association commissioned the famed architectural firm of Adler and Louis Sullivan Dankmar to design the planned building. At the time, was employed as a draftsman in the company of the young Frank Lloyd Wright.

Architecture

Adler and Sullivan constructed a high structure with load-bearing exterior walls. The exterior is partly based on Henry Hobson Richardson's Marshall Field 's Wholesale Store in Chicago. The auditorium was an unusually large building especially at the time of its creation. When completed it was the tallest building in the city, and the largest building complex in the United States.

One of the most innovative parts of the building included the massive foundation slab, designed by Dankmar Adler in collaboration with engineer Paul Mueller. The floor below consists of an approximately 30 -meter-deep layer of soft clay, which made unthinkable conventional foundations. The architects designed the plate from railway sleepers and overlying steel rails embedded in concrete. The whole was covered with pitch.

To the base plate, the large weight of the outside walls was spread over a large area. Nevertheless, the foundation was formed in the more than a hundred years, so that the building is partly about 70 inches lower today. The bending is clearly visible in the lobby of the theater, where the mosaic floor to the outer walls down rather steeply. The column settlement resulted not from a tree Angel, but the construction plans were not changed during construction. Originally it was planned to cover the facade with light terracotta. Instead of terracotta, however, it was decided after the completion of the foundation plate for rock. Much of the deformation took place in the first ten years after the opening of the Auditorium Building. In the meantime, there was a project that provided corrections inside the building. You have not been implemented to date in the act.

In the center of the building, an auditorium with 4327 seats was set up. This was only preferably intended for grand opéra performances. The arrangement of the seats corresponded Ferdinand Peck's ideas. All viewers should have a good view of the stage and not have to give up good acoustics. Lodges were initially not provided. As one yet which recorded in the plan, they were compared with the other seats not favored.

1890 more 136 offices and a hotel with 400 rooms were built around the central part of the building in order to support the opera financially. The actual Auditorium Building, however, was not intended as a commercial entity. The proceeds from the hotel and the rent for the offices served to keep the ticket prices low opera. Within a few years, however, both the hotel and the office block were unprofitable.

History

On 5 October 1887, the then U.S. President Grover Cleveland put the foundation stone for the Auditorium Building. At the nominating convention of the Republican Party in 1888 was held in a partly finished structure, where Benjamin Harrison was nominated as presidential candidate. On December 9, 1889 President Harrison inaugurated the building and the architects Adler and Sullivan directed a their new offices on floors 16 and 17 of the tower.

The Chicago Symphony Orchestra announced on October 16, 1891 his first concert. It was located since its founding to 1904, in the Auditorium Building. Then it moved to the Chicago Orchestra Hall. Theodore Roosevelt gave his famous speech in 1912 at the Auditorium Bull Moose and was nominated by the Independent Progressive Party 's presidential candidate.

The opera company moved in 1929 to the Civic Opera House. A short time later, in the time of the Great Depression, the Auditorium Theatre has been closed. 1941 took over the city of Chicago, the building therein establish a center for the soldiers of the Second World War. Five years later, pulled the Roosevelt University in the Auditorium Building. The former splendor of the theater was, however, not restored.

The Auditorium Theatre was reopened on October 31, 1967 to serve until about 1975 as Chicago's most important venue for rock concerts. During this period occurred among other artists such as Jimi Hendrix, The Who and The Grateful Dead. Since April 17, 1970, it is one of the Registered Historic Places in Illinois. In 1975, the Department of the Interior Auditorium on the list of National Historic Landmarks.

The Auditorium Building was already equipped with extremely early an air conditioning system and the theater was the first, the lighting consisted entirely of light bulbs. 2001 began with a restoration which provides for the recovery of colors used originally in the theater room.

Comments

"The auditorium which built for a syndicate of businessmen to house a large civic opera house; to Provide economic base it on what Decided to wrap the auditorium with a hotel and office block. HENCE Adler & Sullivan had to plan a complex multiple -use building. Fronting on Michigan Avenue, overlooking the lake, which the hotel ( now Roosevelt University ) while the offices were Placed to the west on Wabash Avenue. The entrance to the auditorium is on the south side beneath the tall blocky eighteen - story tower. The rest of the building is a uniform ten stories, organized in the same way as Richardson's Marshall Field Wholesale Store. The interior embellishment, HOWEVER, is wholly Sullivan's, and some of the details, Because of Their continuous curvilinear foliate motifs, are among the nearest equivalents to European Art Nouveau architecture. "

" The auditorium was built for a syndicate of businessmen to house a large urban opera house. In order to provide an economic basis, it was decided to rebuild the auditorium with a hotel and an office building. Therefore, Adler & Sullivan had to design a multi-purpose building. Located on Michigan Avenue, overlooking the lake, this hotel stood (now Roosevelt University ), while the offices were placed at the northwest trending Wabash Avenue. The entrance to the auditorium is located on the south side below the mighty eighteen- storey tower. The rest of the building is uniform zehngeschossig, organized similar to Richardson's Marshall Field 's Wholesale Store. The decorations in the interior, however, are entirely Sullivan's work, and some of the same details for its winding foliage motifs similar examples of European Art Nouveau. "

"Some interior details were probably drawn by Frank Lloyd Wright, who started in Sullivan 's office as a draftsman in 1887. "

" Some elements inside the building were likely drawn by Frank Lloyd Wright, who started in Sullivan's office as a draftsman in 1887. "

Gallery

Auditorium Theatre

Auditorium Theatre

Dining room of the hotel