Eero Saarinen Celebrated
by Phyllis Tuchman
NOVEMBER 17, 2009 TAGS:
When he was in his 40s, Eero Saarinen, a stocky, blue-eyed, pipe-smoking, Finnish-American, designed some of the most beautiful, distinctive, and graceful buildings and structures in the United States. On the East Coast and in the heartland of the country, you’ll find the former TWA airlines terminal at JFK airport, the St. Louis Arch, Manhattan’s CBS building (aka Black Rock), Dulles Airport outside Washington, D.C., and in the Quad cities, the administrative headquarters of John Deere. Hardly any of these innovative architectural touchstones has aged. It’s the automobiles whizzing along, the clothing worn by passersby, and the technology on desks in the interiors that have changed dramatically.
Saarinen, the subject of a compelling exhibition on view now at the Museum of the City of New York until Jan. 31, 2010, never saw these masterpieces completed. His gifted assistants finished them after he died following an operation for a brain tumor in 1961. He was 51.
Born in Finland nearly 100 years ago, on Aug. 20, 1910, Eero Saarinen was raised in Hvittrask, 22 miles outside Helsinki. His father, Eliel (1873-1950), an accomplished architect, designed the Finnish pavilion at the great Paris International Exposition of 1900, the Helsinki Central Railway Station, Kleinhans Music Hall in Buffalo, NY, and the Cranbrook Educational Community in Bloomfield Hills, Mich. Early on, young Eero was a fixture in his dad’s studio. By the time he was 15, he was constructing presentation models for his father. Three years later, the teenager was executing sculptural details as well as furniture for the family business.
Saarinen also had a talent for winning competitions, a handy trait for architects young and old. When he was 12, he took first place in a contest sponsored by a Swedish newspaper, having created a picture story made from matchsticks. In 1926, three years after the family moved to Evanston, Ill., and then, Ann Arbor, the teenager was awarded a first prize for a figure he carved from a bar of soap. Later, at the School of Architecture at Yale, he was cited for so many projects, he was nicknamed “Second medal Saarinen.”
After studying sculpture in Paris for a year, Saarinen returned home in May 1930 and worked again for Eliel. Sixteen months later, he enrolled at Yale. There, the young man designed Beaux Arts-inspired projects, including a water tower, a police station, a palace for an exiled monarch, a monumental clock. After graduating in 1934, he went to Finland to oversee his father’s entry for the Helsinki Post Office and Telegraph competition.
For several years, Saarinen traveled extensively with a fellowship he’d won at Yale. Besides driving from Naples to Sweden and back, he eventually went to Beirut, Baalbek, Budapest, Bremen and points in between. On his return to the States, he again helped his father with current projects. In 1938, he went to New York where, in the office of Norman Bel Geddes, he worked on the General Motors Pavilion, with its legendary Futurama section, for the Worlds Fair of 1939. That fall, Saarinen collaborated with Eliel on Kleinhaus Music Hall, which is still used for concerts and special events.
As war loomed on the horizon, Eero Saarinen garnered attention for buildings and furniture he’d designed. A prize-winning festival theater and fine arts building as well as the molded plywood chairs he co-designed with Charles Eames were exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art. In 1939, he married and a year later, became an American citizen. In 1942, the year his first child was born — he and his wife had another a few years later — Saarinen joined the Army and served in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in Washington, D.C.
After the Armistice, as vets returned, women stayed home, and baby boomers were born, Saarinen rose to prominence on his own. His office earned commissions for all sorts of public buildings. At 13 college and university campuses, Saarinen constructed dorms, chapels, student centers, dining halls, auditoriums, and a hockey rink. In New York, Washington, D.C., and Athens, Greece, he designed airport terminals that make flying a thrill. Titans of industry turned to his office for designs for their company headquarters and plants: John Deere (Iowa), General Motors (Michigan), IBM (Minnesota and New York State), Bell Telephone Laboratories (New Jersey), and CBS (New York City). In Oslo and London, Saarinen erected American embassies. And towering above all of these buildings was the symbol of a city, the breathtaking St. Louis Arch, a gleaming catenary curve beside the Mississippi River.
To create these massive edifices, Saarinen mentored a dazzling team of young architects, including, for varying lengths of time, Robert Venturi, Kevin Roche, John Dinkerloo, Warren Platner, and Cesar Pelli. Several years ago, Roche explained how, before putting pencil to paper, Saarinen researched site restraints and building codes he needed to confront. Then, he backed up his ideas with several alternatives. As Pelli once put it, “Many times, he jumped and he didn’t like it, and he went back and started again.”
Saarinen’s buildings have distinctive exteriors and spacious interiors. When you drive past some of them, say, TWA or Yale’s Ingalls Hockey Rink, if it weren’t for the context — an airport, a college campus — you might think you were approaching sculpture for giants. With their shapely fenestration, they gleam and beckon in the dead of night.
The architect also introduced an eclectic mix of materials. The John Deere headquarters was the first building to be constructed from Cor-Ten steel. The outer walls of Morse and Stiles Colleges, which resemble a mini-San Gimignano, the Tuscan tower town, are made from a gorgeous blend of stones and concrete. As for CBS headquarters on Sixth Avenue, between 52nd and 53rd Streets, it was the first skyscraper in New York to be constructed in reinforced concrete (its nickname, Black Rock, comes from the V-shaped columns clad in Canadian granite).
To be sure that he was on the right track, Saarinen occasionally made practically life-size models of what he was about to build. He never had to wonder about the furniture he put inside his awesome spaces. His Pedestal chairs and tables -- and the Womb chair, too -- are icons of 20th-century design. If you didn’t know the architect’s name, which is a fixture of New York Times crossword puzzles, you would recognize in an instant that you’ve sat on his chairs. With the traveling exhibition, Eero Saarinen: Shaping the Future, now at its penultimate destination — it will wind up at Yale next spring — thousands of people who work or live near his buildings now have a name to match with the work.
Saarinen, the subject of a compelling exhibition on view now at the Museum of the City of New York until Jan. 31, 2010, never saw these masterpieces completed. His gifted assistants finished them after he died following an operation for a brain tumor in 1961. He was 51. Born in Finland nearly 100 years ago, on Aug. 20, 1910, Eero Saarinen was raised in Hvittrask, 22 miles outside Helsinki. His father, Eliel (1873-1950), an accomplished architect, designed the Finnish pavilion at the great Paris International Exposition of 1900, the Helsinki Central Railway Station, Kleinhans Music Hall in Buffalo, NY, and the Cranbrook Educational Community in Bloomfield Hills, Mich. Early on, young Eero was a fixture in his dad’s studio. By the time he was 15, he was constructing presentation models for his father. Three years later, the teenager was executing sculptural details as well as furniture for the family business.
Saarinen also had a talent for winning competitions, a handy trait for architects young and old. When he was 12, he took first place in a contest sponsored by a Swedish newspaper, having created a picture story made from matchsticks. In 1926, three years after the family moved to Evanston, Ill., and then, Ann Arbor, the teenager was awarded a first prize for a figure he carved from a bar of soap. Later, at the School of Architecture at Yale, he was cited for so many projects, he was nicknamed “Second medal Saarinen.”
After studying sculpture in Paris for a year, Saarinen returned home in May 1930 and worked again for Eliel. Sixteen months later, he enrolled at Yale. There, the young man designed Beaux Arts-inspired projects, including a water tower, a police station, a palace for an exiled monarch, a monumental clock. After graduating in 1934, he went to Finland to oversee his father’s entry for the Helsinki Post Office and Telegraph competition.
For several years, Saarinen traveled extensively with a fellowship he’d won at Yale. Besides driving from Naples to Sweden and back, he eventually went to Beirut, Baalbek, Budapest, Bremen and points in between. On his return to the States, he again helped his father with current projects. In 1938, he went to New York where, in the office of Norman Bel Geddes, he worked on the General Motors Pavilion, with its legendary Futurama section, for the Worlds Fair of 1939. That fall, Saarinen collaborated with Eliel on Kleinhaus Music Hall, which is still used for concerts and special events.As war loomed on the horizon, Eero Saarinen garnered attention for buildings and furniture he’d designed. A prize-winning festival theater and fine arts building as well as the molded plywood chairs he co-designed with Charles Eames were exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art. In 1939, he married and a year later, became an American citizen. In 1942, the year his first child was born — he and his wife had another a few years later — Saarinen joined the Army and served in the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in Washington, D.C.
After the Armistice, as vets returned, women stayed home, and baby boomers were born, Saarinen rose to prominence on his own. His office earned commissions for all sorts of public buildings. At 13 college and university campuses, Saarinen constructed dorms, chapels, student centers, dining halls, auditoriums, and a hockey rink. In New York, Washington, D.C., and Athens, Greece, he designed airport terminals that make flying a thrill. Titans of industry turned to his office for designs for their company headquarters and plants: John Deere (Iowa), General Motors (Michigan), IBM (Minnesota and New York State), Bell Telephone Laboratories (New Jersey), and CBS (New York City). In Oslo and London, Saarinen erected American embassies. And towering above all of these buildings was the symbol of a city, the breathtaking St. Louis Arch, a gleaming catenary curve beside the Mississippi River.
To create these massive edifices, Saarinen mentored a dazzling team of young architects, including, for varying lengths of time, Robert Venturi, Kevin Roche, John Dinkerloo, Warren Platner, and Cesar Pelli. Several years ago, Roche explained how, before putting pencil to paper, Saarinen researched site restraints and building codes he needed to confront. Then, he backed up his ideas with several alternatives. As Pelli once put it, “Many times, he jumped and he didn’t like it, and he went back and started again.”
Saarinen’s buildings have distinctive exteriors and spacious interiors. When you drive past some of them, say, TWA or Yale’s Ingalls Hockey Rink, if it weren’t for the context — an airport, a college campus — you might think you were approaching sculpture for giants. With their shapely fenestration, they gleam and beckon in the dead of night. The architect also introduced an eclectic mix of materials. The John Deere headquarters was the first building to be constructed from Cor-Ten steel. The outer walls of Morse and Stiles Colleges, which resemble a mini-San Gimignano, the Tuscan tower town, are made from a gorgeous blend of stones and concrete. As for CBS headquarters on Sixth Avenue, between 52nd and 53rd Streets, it was the first skyscraper in New York to be constructed in reinforced concrete (its nickname, Black Rock, comes from the V-shaped columns clad in Canadian granite).
To be sure that he was on the right track, Saarinen occasionally made practically life-size models of what he was about to build. He never had to wonder about the furniture he put inside his awesome spaces. His Pedestal chairs and tables -- and the Womb chair, too -- are icons of 20th-century design. If you didn’t know the architect’s name, which is a fixture of New York Times crossword puzzles, you would recognize in an instant that you’ve sat on his chairs. With the traveling exhibition, Eero Saarinen: Shaping the Future, now at its penultimate destination — it will wind up at Yale next spring — thousands of people who work or live near his buildings now have a name to match with the work.
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