Grey Room, Inc. "Stimmung" at Seagram: Philip Johnson Counters Mies Van Der Rohe Author(s): Phyllis Lambert Source: Grey Room, No. 20 (Summer, 2005), pp. 38-59 Published by: The MIT Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20442686 . Accessed: 05/09/2014 12:49 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. The MIT Press and Grey Room, Inc. are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Grey Room. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 134.84.192.103 on Fri, 5 Sep 2014 12:49:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions EMI I 12 | 1~~~~~~~~~~1 II *~~~~~~~~~~~~i 11. Disp&y lighs (top) in Seagramon Result: were deagoedfor executive one of the bet-iuminated meetingro, disappearinto buildingsever constructed. ciling whn not inus They tumnme endmeetingof room 13. Ls.boue oeAs form intoeffeci stage. a conthfnus11%-foot-wlde baudamund the perimeter of 12. I*vL lihtseourc thebuilding. 0m (above) (centerrow above) were used w designedby Ketlmhum through buidig. Here & Sharp for 0. E. Me theyepiU a' wash of light Inte Inc, showsmodua over ceference-roomwalls, ceilinggrid in metnide offme sodmake ! ot o ght on and corridr,plus a low conferencet ightng brightnmsytm for 140. Consulant , dor okcesaes. Thi0xyol 1? coUahorte with LigtingL providesmexlent ligbtSt DedgeerBdine Frio%ud desk surfaces,Each nMil r coneaed lightwnxma to il tmelm1inou ceIlg band I* luminxmaMezecad dev lit up on .ery fkoor,I,_o torslack in lobb, and to videsa dramaticapectke mm lightpaInting asd tapertrie Ifanaluban'skyr line (Ib) Arthtt.ctridFontm / July1IW Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Seagram Building, New York, 1954-1958. From Architectural Forum 109 (July1958). Photos: George Cserna, Alexandre Georges, Ezra Stoller ? Esto. 38 This content downloaded from 134.84.192.103 on Fri, 5 Sep 2014 12:49:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions timninung at Seagram:n PhiipJonson ounters ies aner Rohe S~~~~~~~ _ 1 PHYLLIS LAMBERT By his own account, Philip Johnson's eyes filled with tears when Mies van der Rohe offered him a partnership as coarchitect of the Seagram Building: "Shall we make itVan der Rohe and Johnson?"' But ironically, although he had been an acolyte ofMies, Johnson was just beginning to break away, to develop his own approach to architecture. Addressing themodalities of Johnson's evolution, this essay draws on new research for a forthcoming book on the building of the Seagram headquarters in New York. The material belongs to a chapter on the design of Seagram as "Ur-building," in.which I go beyond my own long-held assumptions in denying Johnson a significant role in the building's design to reveal some little-discussed aspects of his remarkable contribution to the pro ject. As the book is based on my own involvement with Seagram from 1954 to the present as Director of Planning and "client," it is ofclourse a highly personal account. My method has been to use brainstorming techniques to set aside familiar assumptions and tap intomy own enor mous bank ofmemories and to consider these in light of the historical documents-my files and papers, letters and texts written at the time, documents in the Seagram archives, an extensive bibliographical data base of articles on the building-as well as thewritings ofMies, Philip, and others. The process has led to a number of insights that have in turn opened up fresh lines of investigation thatmight well not have been undertaken otherwise. Gesamtkunstwerk From the outset, Philip Johnson was interested in the Seagram Building as Gesamtkunstwerk, a synthesis of elements that results in a work of "total Alfred Barr, director of the Museum of Modern Art indeed,awithotherexibiin"ahneAt.htoeedidesign." 94 h (MoMA) inNew York, had oriented him in this direction in 1932 when he suggested putting on an industrial design exhibition. The next year, while Johnson was the first director of the department of architecture Gr Rom 2 Sumer200appand thedesi5n." industrial Al205frey arts, BarrBroo, asserted dirctoond M that tssac his programusetsniute "would ofTMhodern be of equal 39t importance to anything [that] we do in painting or sculpture, and, This content downloaded from 134.84.192.103 on Fri, 5 Sep 2014 12:49:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions museum gained a reputationfor establishing standards in design. Before I selectedMies as architectfor the Seagram Building, Philip tookme to Philadelphia tovisit Howe and Lescaze's Philadelphia Saving Fund Societybuilding (1929-1932).There Philip commentedon theattention paid to the interior in relation to the exterior of the building. While I recall that his appreciation of the interior was greater than his interest in the exterior,Philip considered thisDepression-era work tobe the epitomeof "totaldesign." Philip,who knew thatMies's primaryconcern was thearticulation of structure,form, and material, quickly grasped the factthat Seagram presented an unusual opportunity to improve on many of the standard industrialdesign elementsused in officebuildings: doors, elevator cabs, hardware, lightingand plumbing fixtures,and roompartitions, as well as letteringand signage.Johnson reserved this role forhimself, but his contribution to Seagram would prove to be even more far-reaching than he could have foreseen,eventually expanding to include the design of entireoffice floors, lighting strategies for the whole building, thedis play of artwork, the fountains on the plaza, and the design of the great rooms thatmerged with thepublic space at theplaza level.Philip used powerfultheatrical effects to interiorizethe dramatic exterior substance ofMies's building. Six months after Seagram opened in January 1958, the July issue of ArchitecturalForum carried a firstglimpse of thecompleted building. Surprisingly,the article focused on Philip's intentions."Seagram's Custom Look: 13New Ideas forBetter SkyscraperDesign," was an unsigned, nuts-and-boltspiece written fora trademagazine. The Forum critic called Seagram "a half-million square foot laboratory inwhich new and special officedesigns arebeing testedin actual use," creditingthe archi tectswith refusing "to accept a standard material or standard method if theycould seeways of improvingit."3 The numerouspragmatically cap tioned illustrationsstressed thoseelements destined tobecome part of commercial product lines, "a whole catalogue of innovations thatmay soon affectoffice building design throughoutthe U.S." The Forum critic capturedPhilip's intentionsand inadvertentlypointed up the stateof the building art in the late 1950s. Two of the thirteen"new ideas"were rooted inMies's fundamental architecturalconception and language: thebronze and glass curtain wall and Seagram'sair-conditioning system, which "made floor-to-ceiling glasswalls practicalfor the first time." However, one could easily imagine thatPhilip was theForum critic'samanuensis, because theother eleven "new ideas"were Philip's: controlledVenetian blinds, "specially designed to stop inonly threepositions," producing "fayade patterns that always lookneat"; "floor-to-ceilingdoors" that"added nothingto thecost," and 40 GreyRoo 20 This content downloaded from 134.84.192.103 on Fri, 5 Sep 2014 12:49:45 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions were made to "look like integralparts of [the]paneling," giving the "interiorsgreater unity"; movable floor-to-ceilingpartitions, stock itemsredesigned and "greatlysimplified in detail" forSeagram; floor-to ceiling elevatordoors revealingthe custom-designed panels ofan inter woven stainlesssteel and bronzemesh liningthe elevator cabs; signage ina serifedEgyptian Bold fontdesigned by Elaine Lustig foruse through out thebuilding; custom faucetsand otherwashroom fittings;and door handles and signal hardware fabricated inbrushed aluminum and stainlesssteel at a "very,very, minimal" cost over top-qualityhardware, according to themanufacturer. The floor-to-ceilingtravertine slabs foran executive washroom allowed theForum critic to discuss the ceiling grid and custom designed fixtures.However, therewas nomention of the factthat this was clearly not a stock itembut instead derived froma sumptuous Johnsonianconcept fora travertineroom. In fact,it introduceda new Philip Johnson,one who had begun to lavish richand sensuousmate rialson bathrooms.Already in the late1940s he had used leather"tiles" to line the walls of the circular bathroom of his own Glass House, forminga warm, tactileskin thatexuded amusk-like scent.Ten years lateranother critic described themen's andwomen's washrooms Philip designed for the Four Seasons restaurant as "palaces," "the former in BardiglioFiorioto marble andMacassar ebony,the latterin Rose Portas, rosewood,and gold Fortuny[cloth] with theatricalvanities surrounded by [low-wattage]bulbs ... [with]marble shelves containingashtrays adjoining each stool."4 The lastpage of theArchitectural Forum articlewas devoted to three "new ideas" in lighting.A groupingof small imagespointed tocertain specific lightingeffects employed in theSeagram Company officesas well as in other spaces in the building: display lights that disappear