Wainwright Building

Infobox_nrhp | name =Wainwright Building
nrhp_type = nhl


caption = Wainwright Building
location= St. Louis, Missouri
lat_degrees = 38
lat_minutes = 37
lat_seconds = 36
lat_direction = N
long_degrees = 90
long_minutes = 11
long_seconds = 31
long_direction = W
locmapin = Missouri
area =
built =1891
architect= Sullivan,Louis
architecture= Chicago
designated= May 23, 1968cite web|url=http://tps.cr.nps.gov/nhl/detail.cfm?ResourceId=807&ResourceType=Building|title=Wainwright Building |accessdate=2008-06-28|work=National Historic Landmark summary listing|publisher=National Park Service]
added = May 23, 1968
governing_body = State
refnum=68000054

The Wainwright Building is a 10-story red-brick landmark office building in downtown St. Louis, Missouri. Built in 1890-91 and designed by Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan, it was among the first skyscrapers in the world. It was named for local financier Ellis Wainwright [Sullivan also designed the Wainwright Tomb in St. Louis's Bellefontaine Cemetery for his wife Charlotte Dickson Wainwright.] .

Most historians consider the Wainwright Building one of the most important works in American architecture. It is described as "a highly influential prototype of the modern office building" by the National Register of Historic Places.cite web|url=http://www.nr.nps.gov/|title=National Register Information System|date=2007-01-23|work=National Register of Historic Places|publisher=National Park Service] Architect Frank Lloyd Wright called the Wainwright Building "the very first human expression of a tall steel office-building as Architecture." [Citation
last = Wright
first = Frank Lloyd
title = The Tyranny of the Skyscraper
journal = Modern Architecture
pages = 85
publisher = Princeton University Press
location = Princeton
year = 1931 ]

Aesthetically, the Wainwright Building exemplifies Sullivan's theories about the tall building, which included a tripartite (three-part) composition (base-shaft-attic), and his desire to emphasize the height of the building. He wrote: " [The skyscraper] must be tall, every inch of it tall. The force and power of altitude must be in it the glory and pride of exaltation must be in it. It must be every inch a proud and soaring thing, rising in sheer exultation that from bottom to top it is a unit without a single dissenting line." [Citation
last = Sullivan
first = Louis H.
title = The tall office building artistically considered
journal = Lippincott's Magazine
volume =
issue =
pages =
date = March 1896
year =
url = http://www.njit.edu/v2/Library/archlib/pub-domain/sullivan-1896-tall-bldg.html
doi =
id = ]

Historian Carl Condit described the Wainwright as "a building with a strong, vigorously articulated base supporting a screen that constitutes a vivid image of powerful upward movement." [cite book
last = Condit
first = Carl W.
title = The Chicago School of Architecture: A History of Commercial and Public Building in the Chicago Area, 1875-1925
publisher = University of Chicago Press
date = 1973
isbn = 0226114554
ISBN status = May be invalid - please double check]

The ornamentation for the building is adopted from Notre-Dame de Reims in France.

After a period of neglect, the building now houses Missouri state offices and is well maintained.

Image gallery

References

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External links

* [http://www.bluffton.edu/~sullivanm/wainwright/wainwright.html Images and architectural information]
* [http://projectchicago.org/database/1STL/0003/index.html#TOP projectchicago.org entry: St. Louis' Wainwright Building]
*Whmc stl photodb|keywords=Wainwright+Building|title=Wainwright Building