chicago school
A pre-modern style that emphasizes the simplicity and modular regularity of a building's skeletal framework.
Pictured: Guaranty Building
The Chicago School of Architecture was a proto-modernist style which arose during the building boom after the Chicago Fire. It was a major step toward the simplicity of modern architecture, and although it often incorporates traditional decoration, the ornament is subordinated to the overall structural scheme.
The style was used in many of the first steel-framed buildings, and the facade typically expresses the regularity of the rectangular steel grid underneath, with large windows expressing the openness of the steel frame. The style spread throughout the American Midwest to the coasts and Canada.
The two most prolific and important firms in the early development of the Chicago School were Holabird & Roche and Burnham and Root. The firm of Adler & Sullivan designed many of this style's most refined works, with intricate organic decorations in a style related to Art Nouveau.
Approximate Dates: 1885 to 1920
