Howard Barnstone 1923-1987

Stephen Fox

ne sometimes has the feeling that Howard Barnstone once remarked that at least half of the people who live the Menil House was a source of almost Oin got here by accident. The pattern obsessive fascination to him and his recurs: a chance visit, an unanticipated students during its construction in 1949 invitation to remain on what seems to be and 1950. They would haunt the building a short-term basis, and then opportunities site after hours to inspect its progress, arise, connections arc made, and without drawn there out of reverence for (he first ever quite making the commitment to built example of modern architecture slay, it becomes "us" and "our" rather many of them had ever seen. The north than "they" and "their." This was a story side of the Menil House was all wall, the that Howard Barnstonc, who died on 29 south side all glass, the roof awesomely April at the age of 64, loved to tell. It was fiat and edged by that fabulous Miesian the summer of 1948. Having completed fascia, not merely a construction detail two years of architectural study at Yale, but an icon of modernity. Yet despite its preceded by two years' service in the U.S. impact, Barnstone initially resisted in his Navy, two years before that at Yale own architecture the influence of Ludwig College, and two earlier years at Amherst Mies van der Rohe, whose work was the College, he had come to Houston, the source of 's inspiration. young graduate and registered architect That llrst house in Beaumont, the (you could take the Connecticut licensing Hartman House (1949), and its exam in those days without serving an successors, the Herbert Blum House in apprenticeship as long as you had a Beaumont (1952), the Bloxsom House in professional degree), to visit a distant Houston (1952), and even Barnstone's relative. One afternoon this aunt drove earliest houses with Preston M. Bolton, him out to the University of Houston so his partner from 1952 until 1961. the that he might look around the architec- Hardison and Rottersmann houses (1953 ture department, begun the year before as and 1954), were "contemporary" rather a division of the College of Engineering. than "modern" in design, to employ the He met and conversed with one of the critical distinction of the period. But faculty members. W. H. Linnstaedter, Hugo V. Neuhaus. Jr.'s recommendation who concluded their chat by proposing that Mr. and Mrs. de Menil retain that Barnstone teach at Houston. Barnstone to correct some problems they Barnstone accepted, thinking it might be were experiencing with air-conditioning amusing to spend a couple of years in ducts and the awesomely flat roof brought Texas before he returned to Maine, the Barnsione into irresistible contact with state where he was born and where he the Johnson house. "I learned more in six intended to start a practice. The past months about detailing and water- eight years of his life had been divided proofing and, by osmosis, proportions into two-year segments; two years in than from four years of graduate studies Houston would round out the decade. in architecture at Yale." Barnstone later remarked of the experience.' He succumbed to the impact of Mies, Barnstone never made it back to Maine. hesitantly at first, in his and Bolton's He soon had a host of promising students house for his cousin Evelyn Rosenthal at the University of Houston - Burdette (1954) and then unabashedly in their Kecland, William R. Jenkins, Kenneth Lawrence Blum House in Beaumont Benlsen, Harwood Taylor - and his llrst (1954). the first of the canonical series of job, a small house in Beaumont. During Bolton and Barnstone houses: Gordon the spring semester of that academic year (1955). Moustier(l956), Farfel (1957), the American Institute of Architects held Hosen (1957), Smilhers (1958). Owsley its annual convention in Houston. Frank (1961). Cook (1959), Wintcrbolham Lloyd Wright came to accept the (I960), and Challinor (1961). institute's Gold Medal, and to bestow his opinions, the most memorable being his pronouncements on the Shamrock Hotel, These houses were conceived as which had its fabled opening the week structural cages, with the frames (almost after the AIA convention. It was that always of steel, although on occasion of spring as well that two other new wood) expressed externally. They Houstonians, the French immigrants exhibited geometric precision and, in the Dominique Schlumbcrger and Jean de contrast of their delicately modulated Menil, embarked on an architectural framing members and interstitial wall project that was to prove pivotal in panels (of brick - or wood Barnstone's life: commissioning Philip wcatherboarding - and glass), a sure Johnson, then director of the department sense of proportion. Ostensibly of architecture at The Museum of "Miesian," they betrayed a debt not only Modern Art, to design their house in to Philip Johnson (most evident in the Briarwood. Although it may well seem Farfel, Smithers, and Cook houses) but to that light years separated the Shamrock Charles Eamcs's Case Study House in Hotel and the Menil House, it was in the Santa Monica (1949), of which the space between them that the history of Gordon House, with its double-volume modern Houston was to be made, a living and dining room, was an history with which Barnstone's life was elaborated, more conventionally formal intertwined. rendition. Colin Rowe's suggestion of a Cite Fall 1987 19

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IT.. • •»• Maher House, 1964, Howard Barnstone and Partners, architects Rosenthal House, 1954, Bolton and Barnstone, architects

Palladian permutation proved especially conduct.' Henry-Russell Hitchcock, who, appealing to Barnstone. who used the when in 1959 he admired Bolton and term to characterize the Moustier. Owsley. Barnstone's "distinctly personal" Winterbotham. and Challinor houses. development of the "now classic model" in their Gordon House, then proceeded to Yet identification of influences can be cite the Greek Revival movement as the misleading if il causes one to overlook last episode in architectural history in the most startling aspect of Bolton and which "individuality in the handling of a Burnstone's work: the wide range of their stringent and widely accepted mode of often idiosyncratic adaptation of design counted for so much," implicitly conventional domestic programs to the acknowledged the invidious distinction requirements of the regular Micsian being claimed in Houston: authentic container, Their internal planning confrontation with the conditions of the diagrams were exceedingly quirky, present and the sanction of history/ possessing none of the measure and clarity of Philip Johnson's domestic The discipline of Mies, even that of the plans, although their aim was the same: Miesian image, imposed a semblance of to create those high, static, limpid consistency on this period, not only in volumes thai seemed, paradoxically, to Barnstone's architecture but, as Hewitt expand to infinity, thanks to the hypnotic discerned, on vanguard architecture in effect of walls of glass. In Bolton and Houston. After I960 this consistency Barn stone's houses, these spaces were evaporated. Barnstone wrote of Mies and likely to be experienced along with much Wright as "the Academy" and of the more compact enclosures, sometimes inexorability of change: air-conditioning - rather constricted in feeling, but more freed architecture from climatic often intimate, a sensation that Barnstone responsibility; the car was the new datum Winterbotham House, 1960, Bolton and Barnstone, architects became adept at producing. of urban and architectural order.*

Mark A. Hewitt has written about this During the 1960s the two trends most episode in Houston's architectural history readily visible in the work of Howard ("Neoclassicism and Modern Architec- Barnstone and Partners (as his practice ture - Houston Style," Cite. Fall 1984), was known from 1961 to 1966, following discreetly anonymous street elevations. the opposite of the Miesian houses. Built and more recently il has been the dissolution of Bolton and Barnstone) of reinforced concrete, they emphasized, acknowledged in critiques of Renzo and of Howard Barnstone and Eugene Ai Howard Barnstone and Partners' even exaggerated, particularities of Piano and Richard Fitzgerald and Aubry (his partnership from 1966 to 1969 Vassar Place Apartments (1965) these program and construction. Here the big- Partners' Menil Collection museum, most with Eugene Aubry, a former student attributes informed the design of a small scaled structural pieces dominated, rather insistently by Reyner Banham. who who began working for him in 1959) apartment enclave. Barnstone took full than framed, in-filled bays of concrete positioned Houston alongside Chicago were constructional expression and a nco- advantage of a strategically located and block (or brick) and glass. Barnstone and Los Angeles as a place where a vernacular. Both can be seen in the work configured site to create a complex later was prone to recount - without distinctive lotal school of steel-framed of the architect who supplanted Mies as sequence of inwardly focused interior and amusement the time that Louis I. Kahn modern architecture developed in the the new cultural hero of the architectural : exterior spaces. Barnstone and Aubry's (who had begun leaching at Yale when 1950s. What is most intriguing about vanguard, Paul Rudolph. Less obvious Levin House in Galveston (1968) and Barnstone was a student) showed up this episode - and especially Barnstone's were a concerted exploration of spatial Kempncr House (1969) were further unannounced at his office to give him a part in it - is how it differed from the I1T variety and intimacy, and the extensions of this idea, as were Guinan critique of the "brutality" of the Center school of Chicago and the Case Study domestication of the automobile. Hall at the University of St. Thomas for the Retarded. school of Los Angeles. The idea of (1971) and the adjacent baukunst, whether as a theoretically The Bolton and Barnstone projects (1971), in which intimacy, spatial Yet despite its aggressive, forbidding conceived discipline (Chicago) or an" completed by Howard Barnstone and fulfillment, and discreet anonymity were aspect from Allen Parkway, onto which it ingenious pragmatic (Los Angeles), Partners exhibited these tendencies. The incorporated into a public building to backs, the Center for the Retarded is not seems to have been far less compelling in Wing House (1962), inspired by Philip produce an atmosphere of profound bereft of the sense of delight that Barnstone's case than the cultivated Johnson's house for Sylvic Schlumberger solemnity and silence. The Barnhart Bay animates so much of Barnstone's work. humanist project of Mr. and Mrs. de Boissonas (1956), was loosely House at Kemah (1968) and the Bell The rear of the complex is visible, but the Menil, which promoted a "spiritual" configured, strung out along a series of House (1968) admitted in their allusion to entrance is hidden, requiring one to (rather than critical materialist) passageways defined by ranks of load- vernacular house types the possibility of follow a circuitous path in order to awareness of modernism. Modern art and bearing brick piers and articulated wood influence by historical models. discover the center. Cars are wended all architecture, by virtue of the nature of joinery. The Hogg Memorial Building at Abandonment of the steel frame in house through the complex, as are pedestrians, their challenge to the provincialism and the Child Guidance Center (1961) design in favor of wood stud construction in intimate walkways sheltered beneath illibcrality of the Houston establishment, retained the characteristic box-like shape (conditioned by economic considerations) awesomely scaled concrete pieces. acquired a sign status; it was not protest and externalized structural frame of the made it possible to inflect buildings to that they registered, but superiority. their sites and to shape internal volumes, earlier work, but its bays were in-filled Howard Barnstone and Partners designed rather than slot them into an armature of with arched windows outlined with brick two houses encompassed by the Brutalist structural bays. The classical precision, rhythmic- surrounds. The Mermel House (1961) was tendency. One, for Barnstone's proportions, and patrician reserve of the intriguing in its development of stepmother, Marti Franco, was a Mies-inspired pavilion made it the programmatically varied shapes The more evident tendency in the work of concrete-framed, stone-faced tower optimal modernist building type to configured around a series of distinct the Barnstone office during the 1960s was house, on the beach at Puerto Vallarta, represent this attitude. Colin Rowe, in garden spaces and a motor court. There, that of the "New Brutalism," in part Jalisco. The other, Barnstone's most 1957. had discerned in such buildings as so many of the qualities that would because it obtained expression in public assured project of the 1960s, was the the Moustier House a significance quite distinguish Barnstone's subsequent work buildings rather than houses: Pincy Point Maher House in River Oaks (1964). This different than that to be deduced from were present: the combination of privacy Elementary School (1964), the Galveston was of steel-framed construction, and it modern architecture of the 1920s: an and intimacy with spatial expansiveness County Publishing Company Building in was epic. The living and dining room aristocratic inclination, a fascination with and extensive glazing, the integration of Galveston (1965). and the Center for the were contained in a 55-by-30-foot "correct" forms of architectural the car, and carefully proportioned yet Retarded (1966). These buildings were pavilion, carried one story above grade 20 Cite Fall 1987

De Saligny Condominiums, Austin, 1983, Howard Barnstone and Robert T. Jackson, architects

on brick piers lhat supported the walls - dissolution of his partnership with Aubry, 18-fool-high steel trusses in-filled with but the break-up of his marriage, and. glass. Inside, one was surrounded by professionally and financially, near space and the canopies of trees growing calamity. A resurgence of this condition in profusion along Buffalo Bayou. in 1985 caused another episode of Schlumberger Austin Systems Center, 1987, Howard Barnstone simply described the house as extreme uncontrolled behavior followed Barnstone and Robert T. Jackson, architects a "p-a-1-a-c-e." But rather than by one-and-one-half years of depression, Versailles, it was a modern Escorial. For which Barnstone escaped in the end by like the Galveston County Publishing taking an overdose of sleeping pills. Company Building and the Center for the Retarded, the Maher House possessed an In 1970 he was faced with the necessity of almost privational sense of austerity. It starting over again. Electroshock therapy was this attribute that imbued it with left him dazed, it impaired his memory, authentic grandeur. Where Barnstone and it did not eradicate his manic- tempered austerity, it was not with luxury depressive condition. Friends supported but with wit. Cars lived with the family. him with minor commissions - a guest They descended ramps beneath the main house for Mr. and Mrs. de Menil (1970) entrance, drove through the bedrooms, and a small office building for Albert B. and came to rest underneath the living Fay (1970), both rather tentative, and dining room pavilion. In the amply nondescript works. In spile of emotional dimensioned reception hall, the door to oscillations that did not entirely abate the powder room was discreetly until correct doses of lithium were differentiated from other doors by its determined in the late 1970s, Barnstone material and finish: brushed stainless resisted the crippling effects of internal steel. turmoil and a widely disseminated reputation tor craziness to rebuild his Two projects exemplified the delight, practice. In this he was aided by a spontaneity, and anti-pretentious succession of talented young assistants expediency that were characteristic of (among them, Anthony E. Frederick, Barnstone and Aubry's work. One was Hossein Oskouie. Jim Powers. Theodore B. the design of executive offices on the Gupton, Roger Dobbins, Edward Rogers, Br* forty-fourth floor of 277 Park Avenue in and Rudolph Colby) and New York for Schlumberger, Ltd. (1966). professional collaborators (Anthony The other, one of the partnership's last Disunno. Robert T. Jackson, Doug projects, was the corrugated iron- Michels, and Carlos Jimenez). Barnstone sheathed Art Barn (subsequently known had the ability lo design through his as the Rice Museum. 1969) for Mr. and associates, lo mold and shape by Mrs. de Menil on the campus of Rice instruction, criticism, and humor University. The Schlumberger, Ltd. (sometimes gentle, other limes caustic). offices were where the Wiggle Wall, as But in turn his assistants learned from C. Ray Smith called it in Progressive him, absorbing his inclinations, attitudes, Architecture, originated: steel-framed and prejudices to the extent that they glass partitions circling the core in carried into their own careers as much of irregularly angled configurations, Barnstone as Barnstone had extracted Center for the Retarded, 1966. Howard Barnstone and generating a sense of spatial buoyancy from ihem during their apprenticeships. Eugene Aubry, architects animated by constantly changing internal This makes the attribution of credit for vistas, an other-world cobbed together ideas difficult. What is not ambiguous with the most expedient means to yield a is ihe consistent look and feel of sensation of "magic" - one of Barnstone's buildings, their combination Barnstone's favorite expressions. of diminutive scale and spatial expansiveness, of proportional grace with wit and charm, however diverse ihey It is melodramatic but not inaccurate to appear formally. say that 1969 was the end of Howard Barnstone's first life, The year before he had been elected to fellowship in the The built works of the 1970s were not American Institute of Architects. In 1966 numerous, but they were varied - in his book. The Galveston That Was. with location, program, size, and appearance. photographs by Henri Cartier-Bresson Marti's. the specialty store for his and Ezra Stoller, was published by stepmother in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas Macmillan, the result of four years' work (1972), the three, 16-foot-widc Grausuirk under the sponsorship of Family Townhouses (1973). alterations and James Johnson Sweeney. But these and additions to the Hcrzog House (1974). achievements masked a personal crisis of the Riboud House in Carefree, Arizona catastrophic proportions. During 1969 (1976), additions to the Robert Barnstone Barnstone underwent intensive House in Austin (1976), the Encinal electroshock therapy, which was condominium apartments in Austin customarily prescribed to treat manic- (1979), and the Schlumberger-Doll depressive psychosis before it was Research Center in Ridgefield. discovered that the condition resulted Connecticut (1980) represented particular from a deficiency of lithium. This responses to existing conditions, psychosis was the tragedy of Barnstone's developed with ingenuity and tact. Spatial life. It not only brought about the sensation was a common attribute of Cite Fall 1987 21

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these buildings, whether it was achieved idiosyncrasies of the site, so that human by complex configurations or the artifice complements and underscores seductive effect of glazed openings. The natural conditions, as it does also with graying of Do-ville, Barn stone's surreal the filtering of skylight into the "Broad chromatic unification of the bungalows Way," Barnstone's name for the internal and apartment houses assembled by Mr. promenade. and Mrs. dc Menil in the vicinity of the Rothko Chapel (1974), was a telling In the course of his 39-year career *$¥>:•--• example of his instinct for making Howard Barnstone demonstrated