N EN S COVER DESIGN. Drawing by Arthur G. Byne. Page A RENAISSANCE IN COMMERCIAL ARCHITECTURE . C. Matlack Price 449 SOME RECENT BUILDINGS IN UP-TOWN NEW YORK. Illustrations from Photographs. A STUDY OF ROMANESQUE IN SPAIN / . M. Stapley . 471 THE SECOND GROUP-CATALONIA. Illustrations from Photographs by A. G. Byne. THE DEVELOPMENT OF A GREAT CITY . Otto Wagner . 485 TOGETHER WITH AN APPRECIATION OF THE AUTHOR BY A. D. F. HAMLIN. Illustrations from Photographs and Drawings. PORTFOLIO OF RECENT SUBURBAN HOUSES 501 SELECTION OF THE WORK OF WM. M. KENYON, ARCHITECT. ARCHITECTURE OF AMERICAN COLLEGES . Montgomery Schuyler 513 PART X. -THREE WOMEN'S COLLEGES VASSAR, WELLESLEY AND SMITH. Illustrations from Photographs. H. A. Caparn . 539 Illustrations from Photographs. II . EARLY AMERICAN CHURCHES ... Aymar Embury 547 PART VI. DEERFIELD WINSTON SALEM, OLD SOUTH, BOSTON, AND OLD DUTCH, TAPPAN. Illustrations from Photographs. NOTES AND COMMENTS 557 Published by THE ARCHITECTURAL RECORD COMPANY . CLINTON W. SWEET Vice-Praident . HARRY W. DESMOND . FRED W. DODGE Secretary . FRANKLIN T. MILLER HARRY W. DESMOND Editor RUSSELL F. WHITEHEAD .... Associate Editor RALPH REINHOLD Business Manager 11-15 EAST TWENTY-FOURTH STREET. NEW YORK CITY Yearly Subscription $3.00. Published Monthly 25 Cents Price of Numbers more than 12 months old. 50 Cents each MS. L:-^ g.- .'.:.- .' -. -. , -. ;. ?.'- Copyright. 1912, by "THE ARCHITECTURAL RECORD COMPANY." All rights reserved. tnwred May 22. 1902, as second-class matter. Post Office at New York. N. Y- Act of Congress of March }d, 1879 RESIDENCE OF GEORGE W. NICOLA'S, ESQ., PITTSBURGH, PA. JANSSEN & ABBOTT, ARCH'TS. ARCHITECTVRAL RECORD MAY, 1912 VOLUME XXXI NUMBER V A LITTLE OVER FIVE YEARS AGO the stand- and J. H. Freedlander, as well as several ard of excellence in commercial archi- newer firms. tecture was raised to a height previously It is doubtful if any one year has seen unknown by the erection of the build- the erection of the type of commercial ings for Tiffany and Company, Gorham building dealt with in this review to so and the Knickerbocker Trust Company. great an extent as this last year in New The effect of these buildings was to start York, while every week is signalized by a wave of ambitious alteration and con- the demolition of some older building struction from Madison Square to the and the commencement of a new one. Plaza a wave which even now is not, On both sides of Fifth avenue, and in perhaps, at its height. New buildings sites near the avenue, in many side- began to appear above Forty-second streets, are appearing new business prem- street, which zone has witnessed the ises whose architectural aspect is of greater part of the new work of the past marked interest, for the reason that each twelve months, and the metamorphosis of one represents, apart from the consider- New York shop-fronts is of such a sig- able cost of its construction, a manifest nificant nature that a review of their intention on the part of each owner to present aspect cannot be out of place. express in it, to the best of his un- The architects who are represented in derstanding, a symbol of the character, this fast-growing array of varied types dignity, standing and prosperity of of design are, for the most part, among his house in such a manner and locality the most prominent in the city Carrere that all who run may read. and Hastings, Warren and Wetmore, Thus the aspect of this strenuous year Harry Allan Jacobs, Delano and Aldrich of commercial building must necessarily 4-0 450 THE ARCHITECTURAL RECORD. attract no small amount of critical atten- Fifth avenue architecture. Owing to the tion on account of the occasion which it great diversity which our tastes seem to presents for the study and comparative exhibit, general remarks or broadly analysis of the varied stylistic expres- taken comparisons are worse than use- sions which it presents of expressions less, being not only confusing, but in- of many different kinds which are gov- dividually unfair to the buildings under erned throughout by the same sets of consideration. conditions. In other words, each one of The lucidity of a review may be im- these buildings was primarily designed paired so seriously by a hair's breadth to furnish premises for the housing of deflection at the outset, that it is worth certain more or less exclusive business while to define a certain method of ob- firms in quarters which should reflect servation especially where the buildings their aims and ideals, yet each one was to be reviewed are of such widely differ- restricted, in extent varying but little, as ing natures, and where it is so stupid to to the area of site and as to the location say, in an off-hand manner that one is on or near the most exclusive shopping better than another. It would be as ab- avenue of the city. How then, other surd to say that St. Patrick's Cathedral than by attribution to the personal pref- is a better building than the New York erence or taste of the client and the Public Library, or that a fork is better architect may the amazing diversity of than a spoon. styles in design be explained? Furthermore, to speak personally, I It is fortunate that up to this time, no have little patience with the reviewer attempt has been made by architectural who fancies but one style, and seeks to dilettanti to talk of an "American Style" make it paramount by the disparagement in city architecture. It is fortunate in- of all others. It is understood that one asmuch as there is no such style, never has one's preferences, but if a certain has been and, in all probability, never building happens to be a well-studied will be such a style. That all our city adaptation of Italian Renaissance and a buildings are based in their design and certain other an equally well-studied detail upon European prototypes is too adaptation of Louis XVI, I refuse to obvious and well known to enlarge upon, condemn the first and hold it up to the and it is manifest that we can consider derision of all architectural critics simply and criticise these buildings only as because I prefer French architecture of adaptations, of which the success or fail- a certain period. ure must rest solely upon the cleverness Comparisons, in the case in hand, are or stupidity with which the adaptation worse than odious they are stupid. has been carried out. Whether this country is to be congratu- For those who lean toward nicety in lated or not upon the diversity of its designation, I will take this opportunity architectural inspiration is a matter that to illustrate this point by paraphrasing has concerned critics for some time, and certain remarks which I have made else- never so much as to-day was it a matter where upon the critical analysis of do- calling for such nice discrimination. mestic architecture in this country. In the "Victorian Period," when our To say that "The building recently city architecture was a half-hearted copy completed for the Messrs. on upper of the most debased type of building in Fifth avenue is a striking example of Paris, it was reasonably safe to dismiss Italian Renaissance architecture" is ab- it all with a general and sweeping con- surd. The facade of the Palazzo demnation as "an imitation of something Strozzi, in Florence, is a splendid ex- which, even if genuine, would be unde- ample the building on Fifth avenue is sirable." Then came a period domi- an adaptation. It cannot or could not nated in the country by the fantastic be an example. With this in mind it is vagaries of Eastlake, and in the city by possible to form more intelligent and men who consistently misunderstood more definite critical conclusions regard- Richardson, while endeavoring to copy ing the recent additions to the gallery of him. ffflflfflffl \ftttmtm NOS. 556-558 FIFTH AVENUE NEW YORK, CARRERE & HASTINGS, ARCHITECTS. 452 THE ARCHITECTURAL RECORD. It was a period in which the archi- beholder and the serious concern of the tectural ego must have been in a flour- professional observer. ishing" condition, for we blythely under- Whether this diversity is desirable in took to improve upon the classic orders itself is a question by no means readily themselves, and to no less blythely answered whether it is desirable as a ignore the beauties of the Italian Ren- step toward the evolution of a national aissance and the French revival of the architecture (assuming such an archi- eighteenth century. Certain other archi- tecture to be possible) is immediately tects worked with a comprehensive and answerable in the negative. thorough misconstruction of every pre- As long as such successes are achieved cept in Ruskin's writings, which formed in the adaptation of foreign styles, it is at the time almost the only current certain that the conservative client will collection of essays on architecture. defer the investment of his thousands Forgotten were the chaste and dignified of dollars in a new and necessarily ex- ideals of the Classic Revival which pro- perimental style of architecture, until duced "Colonnade Row" on Lafayette the millenium. Place, and designers seemed to fancy Everything is against consistency or themselves endowed with an original originality in architectural design in genius eclipsing that of the Renaissance this country, for we must reckon with Italians, the Brothers Adam, Christopher the modern facilities for extensive Wren and Inigo Jones rolled into one. travel, the multiplicity of books on for- Lastly, and with infinite present rami- eign styles of architecture and the ex- fications, came the era of studied adap- cellence of photography and printing tation, ushered in by McKim, Mead and to-day as compared with the isolation White, who popularized the style of the and centralization of all means of in- Italian Renaissance to an extent which spiration in the periods and countries made it foremost in the better buildings which saw the naissance and evolution of the city.