WBEZ 91.5 Chicago

A threatened Wilmette residence and cottage linked to three important 20th century architects could be spared the wrecking ball under a plan devised by the home builder who originally sought to demolish the structures.

George Hausen, owner of Schaumburg-based Housing Contractors Inc., said he would be willing to sell the main home at 1318 Isabella, designed by architect John Van Bergen, to a new buyer. A neighboring cottage, 1320 Isabella, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright's studio--its original drawings bear the name of Wright's draftsman Rudolph Schindler who later became a preeminent architect himself--would be donated to a preservation group or individual who'd be willing to move the home off the property. 

"My intentions are now, after having some dialog, is that I'm more than willing to market the house at 1318 and sell it as is," Hausen said. "If nobody wants the cottage, it will be demo'd. [But] I'd give someone the time to have it. I don't even close on the property until mid-to-late April."

With the cottage removed, a new home of a size and scale compatible to the neighborhood would be built at 1320, Hausen said.

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Jacques Brownson, the Aurora-born architect who would create two of the city's brawniest examples of 1960s steel-and-glass modernism as chief architect of the Daley Center and the dark-cloaked 55 E. Jackson skyscraper, has died at age 88.

Brownson died Sunday of a heart attack in Colorado, according to an obit by Chicago Tribune architecture critic Blair Kamin. Brownson lived in Colorado since 1972.

Though not as popularly known as his midcentury contemporaries such his mentor Mies van der Rohe, or Bruce Graham of SOM, Brownson nonetheless left a mark. His Geneva House, located in the town of Geneva, IL, completed in 1952 when he was just 29 and designed as part of his master's thesis, is a confident piece of architecture. The single-story steel-and-glass house with non load-bearing interior and exterior walls has been compared favorably Mies' Crown Hall at IIT or the architect's famed Farnsworth House.

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In what could be a stunning architectural loss, a beautiful Wilmette residence with ties to three prominent 20th century architects--including Frank Lloyd Wright--could be demolished by a potential new owner who inquired last week about razing the site for new construction.

Lost would be the James B. Irving House, built in 1928 on a spacious tree-lined lot on Isabella Street and designed by John S. Van Bergen, a Wright protege who became an important architect designing homes in Oak Park, River Forest and along the North Shore. The parcel includes a smaller home built in 1920 at the rear of the yard--a former temporary residence built by Irving and designed by Wright's studio.

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St. Rita of Cascia church cuts a commanding figure on the north side of 63rd Street at Fairfield Avenue.

Built in 1950, the Renaissance Revival church is a bit newer than its other classically-designed Roman Catholic churches around town. Despite is relative modernity, the church was designed with an eye toward the past and was given a wealth of old world detailing. Behold:

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These are rough times, as of late, for buildings designed by architect Edward G. McClellan.

This month, the city demolished a beautiful but vacant three-story corner building designed by McClellan at 79th and Halsted after a portion of the structure collapsed and injured four passersby. And now, an occupied corner commercial building--designed by the same architect--in the Southwest Side neighborhood of Clearing would be razed under a plan to create a safety buffer around Midway Airport.

The 84-year-old Crane and Moreland building, 63rd and Central, sits across from the western edge of the airport. City officials fear that proximity places the building--and four properties surrounding the airport--in danger of being hit by planes landing or taking off. Six years ago, a plane at Midway overshot a runway and struck a car killing a six-year-old boy.

In a Chicago Sun-Times report last November, a city aviation official said acquiring the building "is quite critical — not only for runway protection zones, but also to improve the navigation approach path for aircraft to that runway."

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In a town that celebrates its postwar modernist high-rises, the residential building at 320 W. Oakdale is a might overlooked.

Built in 1954, the 21-story tower has remarkable floor-to-ceiling windows that wrap the box like glass bands. And look at how those concrete floor slabs overhang, providing shade and passive cooling during the high summer sun. The building's Chicago-born architect, Milton Schwartz, was 29 when 320 W. Oakdale was completed. It's a nifty piece of work, especially for an architect so young. Schwartz originally intended the building to be circular--and this would have been just before Bertrand Goldberg's Marina City--as would have been his 36-story Hotel 71 (which opened as the Executive House in 1958) at 71 E. Wacker. In order get get financing, both buildings wound up as boxes, but no worse for the wear.

In the photo below, 320 W. Oakdale creates a dead-end on Commonwealth Avenue. The narrow street provides a nice vista to the building.

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The last thing the South Side needs is another vacant lot. But that's exactly what it'll get in a few days when the wreckage of a three-story commercial building in the Auburn-Gresham neighborhood is cleared away.

That's because the long-vacant 86-year-old building on the southeast corner of 79th and Halsted--a faded terra cotta beauty weakened by time and neglect--gave way under its own weight Tuesday and partially collapsed. Four passersby received minor injuries from the falling debris. I visited the site last night with my camera. The streets and sidewalks near the intersection are closed off for a couple of blocks in either direction, but I was able to get these images by setting up in the parking lot of a CVS pharmacy on the northwest corner.

Built in 1926 and designed by architect Edward G. McClellan, the building was a graceful example of a 1920s neighborhood mixed-use commercial building: retail space on the ground floor and a mixture of offices and apartments above. At three stories and crowned with an intact terra cotta cornice, the building was big enough to hold the corner with some visual authority.

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