Lawrence Modern home

Alfred Caldwell taking in the scenery at the Domer residence in Baldwin, Kans., in 1993.

During the early post-World War II period, Lawrence might have seemed far from the centers of innovative modern architecture — Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, Boston, and Philadelphia. In fact, Lawrence was very connected intellectually to these cities and the towering geniuses of modernism—Frank Lloyd Wright, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and Walter Gropius, among others—because KU’s program in architecture had turned modern in the 1920s through the influence of Professors George Beal, Joe Kellog, and later through the leadership of Professors John C. Morley and Curtis Besinger. Wright was particularly influential on the school, having befriended George Beal, who went to Taliesin West in the mid-1930s during the summer to collaborate with Wright. Wright then frequently stopped in Lawrence on his annual caravans from Taliesin in Wisconsin to his new winter quarters called Taliesin West near Phoenix. Besinger worked for Wright for 17 years, leaving the fellowship as a senior apprentice, and he not only taught Wrightian principles of modern design but also focused on Japanese architecture, which had influenced Wright’s thinking so much. His book, Working with Mr. Wright: What It Was Like, is a revealing Cambridge University Press publication that everyone interested in Wright should read. Morley, a frequent traveler to the European centers of modernism, made many connections for the school, particularly in Denmark and Scotland, where he taught on Fulbright fellowships and received additional training in modern urban design. From about 1925 to 1975, there was no one on the KU faculty who was not a “modern” architect.

As a result, dozens of young architects with modern aesthetics, technologies, and building processes graduated from KU during that key 50-year period. They flooded growing architectural firms in Topeka, Lawrence, Wichita, Kansas City, and St. Louis. They built a gigantic array of new structures that followed the tenets of architecture laid down by their professors, who promulgated modern thinking in studios and classrooms. It was impossible for these graduates to imagine building anything but modern buildings until the smoky pretensions of post-modernism began to creep into the plains during the late 1970s and early 1980s. The work of a generation of KU graduates faces the jeopardies of time and ignorance today, and our website brings that work before the public for evaluation and appreciation. These architects are “shadow figures” of modernism, architects who will never be well known but who made significant contributions to our Midwestern architectural landscape.

Main Pavilion, Eagle Point Park, Dubuque, Iowa 1934. Architect: Alfred Caldwell

The subject of shadow figures of modern architecture is important because there were geniuses among them, some of whom came to KU to teach and lecture. One frequent visitor in the late 1980s and in the 1990s was Alfred Caldwell who was a colleague of Wright, Mies, Craig Ellwood, Hilbesheimer, and other leaders. Caldwell was a visiting professor at KU in 1980 and stayed at our home in south Douglas County on a number of occasions. I worked with him from 1980 until the late 1990s. He retired as the Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Professor of Architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago only two years before he died at the age of 95. He was a modern master, the last one, yet he, like our Lawrence architects, is not very well known because the stars overshadowed everyone. Slowly we are learning about them. Architecture could not have done without them!

“Farmhouse” designed by Alfred Caldwell, Bristol, Wisconsin, 1948

For a short account of Caldwell’s work and to see some of the fabulous landscapes and houses he designed, look at the article “The Last Master,” published in Inland Architecture magazine. It’s a synopsis of the book Alfred Caldwell: The Life and Work of a Prairie School Landscape Architect, published by Johns Hopkins University Press in 1997.

—Dennis Domer

Herman Miller Eames Aluminum Group chair

I confess. I have an addiction to modern chairs. I have accumulated so many that my wife, Terri, often shakes her head in exasperation whenever I bring home my latest acquisition or junk find. “Why did you buy that?” and “Where are you going to put it?” have become the reflex responses. It all started one day in 1998 at an antique store in Helena, Arkansas, while I was visiting a friend in Louisiana. Two seasoned young men were taking a break from refinishing turn-of-the-century furniture, and one of them was sitting in the chair pictured above. I had no idea what the chair was, who made it, or even where I was going to put it, but the unusual shape caught my eye. I asked them if I could give it a spin. One said okay. The chair was surprisingly comfortable. I knew it wasn’t for sale, but I offered $50 cash on a whim anyway. Both quickly declined, saying, “Oh no, it isn’t for sale — this is our sitting chair!” I pressed again to no avail and left, but one of the men followed me out to my truck and said, “We’ll take it.” I loaded it and began my journey back to Lawrence. Little did I know the chair would lead to an obsession with midcentury architecture and, ultimately, to our current home on Owens Lane. When I got back to Lawrence, I showed the chair to a neighbor who confirmed it was an Eames Aluminum Group chair made by a furniture company called Herman Miller. I later learned this model was first released in 1958 and is still sold by the company. It became my office chair at work.

Eames 670/671 Lounge Chair and Ottoman in its natural habitat

Shortly after the Aluminum Group chair purchase, Terri and I were looking through a magazine and saw an Eames 670/671 Lounge Chair and Ottoman. She said, “Oh, I really like that.” I gasped at the price, however, and said I would never spend that much money on a chair. (A new one from Herman Miller costs more than $5,000.) A couple weeks later, I was driving down an alley in Old West Lawrence and spotted an original (Rosewood) Eames 670/671 lounge chair and ottoman near a pair of trash cans. I couldn’t believe it. The leather was ruined, but the shells were in excellent condition. I had them recovered by an upholstery shop in Kansas City for under $1,000. The chair is still in our living room. It’s supremely comfortable, and the smell of the leather and exotic rosewood shells makes sitting in it all the more pleasurable.

Eames 670/671 Lounge Chair and Ottoman & plywood lounge chair

After these two very fortunate furniture finds, I began to scour every garage sale, yard sale, and estate sale in Lawrence on the hunt for more modern furniture. Our home is now filled with vintage furniture and objects — Hans Wegner chairs and tables, George Nelson bubble lamps, an Isamu Noguchi coffee table, pieces by Charles and Ray Eames, and other mod stuff. To make a long story short, my chair fetish sparked an interest in modern design and eventually led to the home we currently live in. It also led to Lawrence Modern. They (the chairs) opened up many doors (literally) for me to meet many wonderful people, photograph beautiful houses, and learn more about our rich history of modernism here in Lawrence.

—Tom