Harry Weese

Infobox Architect


image_size = 160px
caption =
name = Harry Weese
nationality = American
birth_date = birth date|1915|6|30
birth_place = Evanston, Illinois, U.S.
death_date = Death date and age|1998|10|29|1915|6|30
death_place =
practice_name =
significant_buildings= Arena Stage
Time-Life Building
significant_projects = Washington Metrorail
significant_design =
awards =

Harry Mohr Weese (June 30, 1915 - October 29, 1998) was an American architect, who was born in Evanston, Illinois cite news|author=Muschamp, Herbert |title=Harry Weese, 83, Designer of Metro System in Washington |publisher=The New York Times |date=1998, November 3] in the Chicago suburbs who had an important role in 20th century modernism and historic preservation. His brother, Ben Weese, is also a renowned architect.

Background

Harry Weese studied under Finnish architect, Alvar Aalto at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, graduating in 1938, and went on to study city planning while on a fellowship at the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan. Weese was also influenced by Charles Eames and Eero Saarinen, whom he met at Cranbrook. He built primarily in the modern architectural style, but integrated other styles as he felt appropriate for the project. Out of Cranbrook, Weese joined the major architectural and engineering firm, Skidmore, Owings and Merrill. During World War II, Weese served as an engineer on a U.S. Navy destroyer, and 1947, he started his own architectural firm. Weese is also well known for his firm advocacy of historic preservation and was remembered as the architect who "shaped Chicago’s skyline and the way the city thought about everything from the lakefront to its treasure-trove of historical buildings." cite news|title=Harry Weese, Visionary Architect Known as 'Chicago's Conscience' |publisher=Chicago Tribune |date=1998, November 1] Weese also served as a judge for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial design competition.

Works

Other well known works include:
* The United States Embassy Building in Accra, Ghana.
* Arena Stage, Washington, D.C..
* Time-Life Building, Chicago, Illinois.
* First Baptist Church, in Columbus, Indiana.
* Seventeenth Church of Christ, Scientist in Chicago, Illinois.
* The Marcus Center for the Performing Arts in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
* The Humanities Building at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, widely considered one the Midwest's best examples of brutalist architecture but slated for demolition soon.
* The Chazen Museum of Art at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, formerly known as the Elvehjem Museum of Art.
* Mercantile Bank, Kansas City, Missouri.
* Westin Crown Center Hotel, Kansas City, Missouri.
* The former U.S. Embassy to Ghana in Accra.
* Fulton House at 345 N. Canal Street in Chicago. Converted 19th century 16-story cold-storage warehouse building to condominium building.
* River Cottages at 357-365 N. Canal Street in Chicago. Sloped, structurally expressive facade responds to the angle and cross bracing of the railroad bridge directly across the river.
* William J. Campbell United States Courthouse Annex in downtown Chicago (formerly known as the Metropolitan Correctional Center, Chicago.) Brutalist jail which has no window bars, instead each cell is provided with a vertical slot window. These tall narrow window openings work with the triangular footprint of the building, making the building reminiscent of a slender I.B.M computer card from the 1950s and 60's.
* Middletown City Building, Middletown, Ohio.
* Sterling Morton Library, The Morton Arboretum.
* O'Brian Hall at the State University of New York at Buffalo

Weese also led numerous restoration projects including:
* Louis Sullivan's Auditorium Building in Chicago, Illinois 1967.
* Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, Illinois
* Orchestra Hall, Chicago, Illinois
* Union Station, Washington, DC

References

External links

* [http://www.artic.edu/aic/libraries/caohp/weeseh.html Oral history interview with Harry Weese]