OT? - Albert Kahn Buildings on Campus
Lately, I've been doing quite a few pictures in Detroit. In particular, I have been trying to seek out the buildings of Albert Kahn as he was one of the prominent architects of many of the more famous buildings in Detroit. Anyways, I also noticed that he did a bunch of the buildings on the University's main campus.
So last night, I went for a walk around campus and of course I was accompanied by my camera. So here are my blog entries:
http://michiganexposures.blogspot.com/2011/03/angell-hall-university-of-michigan.html
My first stop was Angell Hall
http://michiganexposures.blogspot.com/2011/03/hill-auditorium.html
Then Hill Auditorium
http://michiganexposures.blogspot.com/2011/03/burton-memorial-tower.html
The Tower...Well not *THE* Tower as that's in Ypsi...:)
http://michiganexposures.blogspot.com/2011/03/horace-rackham-school-of-graduate.html
Rackham
http://michiganexposures.blogspot.com/2011/03/harlan-hatcher-library.html
The Grad LIbrary
http://michiganexposures.blogspot.com/2011/03/west-engineering-building.html
West Engineering Building
http://michiganexposures.blogspot.com/2011/03/randall-laboratory.html
Randall Laboratory
http://michiganexposures.blogspot.com/2011/03/cc-little-building.html
The C.C. Little Building
http://michiganexposures.blogspot.com/2011/03/natural-history-museum-building.html
The Natural History Building
I hope you all enjoy.
Christmas came early this year! Can't wait to look at them all.
Also he was very active in Greek Housing:
Greek Organization Buildings:
-
- Sigma Phi House (1900), 426 North Ingalls Street (demolished)
- Delta Upsilon House (1903), 1331 Hill Street
- Collegiate Sorosis House (1905–06), 1501 Washtenaw Avenue
- Delta Gamma House (1912), 1205 Hill Street
- Psi Upsilon House (1925), 1000 Hill Street
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Kahn_(architect)#Kahn-designed_buildings
Yeah, I barely scratched the surface....
Albert Kahn is the father of Eddie Kahn, who scored the first-ever goal for the University of Michigan hockey team.
Eddie Kahn grew up to become Dr Edgar Kahn, longtime head of neurosurgery at Michigan.
Thank you History of College Athletics with John Bacon... or Blue Ice
Don't forget about another, also-famous architect's presence on campus: that of Eero Saarinen. He developed an early master plan for North Campus, as well as designing a number of buildings including the school of music.
He designed the St. Louis Arch, aka The Jefferson National Expansion Memorial.
And my favorite airport terminal building, Terminal A at Dulles International Airport, right down the road from me. Unfortunately it's not really used as a terminal; only for check-in, not even security anymore. But it's still a gorgeous building to walk into.
Clever, +1. I am of Finnish descent like Eero, so maybe I should.
I need to get up to do some photos on North Campus one of these days.
I'd say early to mid-morning is the best time to check out the Engineering campus. There's a lot of new, nice buildings and interesting landscaping to check out. More light is better IMO (viewing-wise...I don't know how it would work for photos).
Not on campus but the Detroit Golf Club clubhouse next door to Palmer Park is an Albert Kahn building. A number of beautiful houses of Kahn's can be found in the Palmer Woods and Sherwood Forest neighborhoods at 7 Mile & Woodward.
...but you missed one of the best Kahn buildings, the Clements library.
Actually, I got that one at an earlier date but I want to take pictures of it again in better lighting. I knew that I wasn't going to get every Kahn building that night so this is more or less an ongoing project for me.
Yeah, there are a ton of Kahn buildings in Detroit.
Albert Kahn's firm also designed the majority of the big three auto plants in MI and OH...these are not great photo opps, but an interesting fact none the less
Yes, I see that you did photograph it already. Here's a direct link to your Clements photos in case anybody else is interested. Thanks again.
Kahn himself said that the Clements Library was his favorite of his designs.
I am ashamed to admit that I walked by those building for 4 years and never appreciated their architectural details and beauty.
Thanks for sharing them!
This is not meant to derail the conversation in a great OT, but I couldn't help notice . . . I didn't realize that there is still snow on the ground up there! Brutal.
It takes more than a couple of days of 40 degrees for it to melt.
(and yes, yes, I know, that's what she said...)
I went through your entire photo history on your blog and, really, have you never been to Cranbrook?
The original Booth house is a Kahn and there's Saarinen all over the place. Get over there!
The former Ann Arbor News buiding, on Division between Washington and Huron, is another Albert Kahn here in Ann Arbor.
Thanks so much for posting. I'll definitly be bookmarking your blog.
i think this is the best mgoboard topic ever. i'm not even kidding.
Isn't Couzens Hall also a Kahn?
Most certainly is.
Didn't see these two mentioned -- the gates at Yost and the Gandy Dancer (aka old train station).
Gandy Dancer? Really? Their website says it was built in 1886, when Kahn was just 17.
You really need to get to campus on a sunny spring/summer day. I personally don't think we have the most beautiful campus architecture, though there are a few nice buildings. However, West Hall (West Engineering) is really beautiful in the Spring/Summer. In fact, I would say, besides the front façade of Angell, West Hall might be the most beautiful building on the Diag. With the twin spires (would you call those spires?) and the ivy, it really looks great in the sun (wish I could get a bigger version of this picture, thanks FB!).
The campus used to have a lot of sick buildings before they were demolished or burned down. If you go next to the Union, there's a little display outside about the history of buildings on campus. I don't know if a lot of people stop to check that stuff out, but there are some really interesting buildings to check out. I particularly liked the old library, especially consider the new one.
That is some amazing architecture there. One thing that stood out was the engineering building and the two green domes. When I was at VT the engineering building was either the traditional 2-story one covered in white stone, there wasn't anything special about it.