Marion Mahony Griffin
Encyclopedia
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
architect and artist. She was one of the first licenced female architect
Architect
An architect is a person trained in the planning, design and oversight of the construction of buildings. To practice architecture means to offer or render services in connection with the design and construction of a building, or group of buildings and the space within the site surrounding the...
s in the world, and is considered an original member of the Prairie School
Prairie School
Prairie School was a late 19th and early 20th century architectural style, most common to the Midwestern United States.The works of the Prairie School architects are usually marked by horizontal lines, flat or hipped roofs with broad overhanging eaves, windows grouped in horizontal bands,...
.
Biography
Marion Mahony Griffin was born in 1871 ChicagoChicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
, the second child and eldest daughter of the five surviving children of Jeremiah Mahony, a journalist from Cork, Ireland, and Clara Hamilton, a schoolteacher. Her family moved to nearby Winnetka after the Great Chicago fire. Growing up there, she became facsinated by the quickly disappearing landscape as suburban homes filled the area. She was influenced by her first cousin, Dwight Perkins, and decided to further her education. She graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...
(M.I.T.) in 1894. She was one of the first women to receive a degree in architecture. Though highly talented, she sometimes struggled with her place in both society and the field. She was unsure of her ability to complete the thesis required for her bachelors degree, but her professor,Constant-Désiré Despradelle, pushed her forward. After graduation, Mahony worked in her cousins architecture firm. The space was shared among many architects, including Frank Lloyd Wright. In 1895 Mahony was the first employee hired by Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright was an American architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1,000 structures and completed 500 works. Wright believed in designing structures which were in harmony with humanity and its environment, a philosophy he called organic architecture...
and went to work designing buildings, furniture
Furniture
Furniture is the mass noun for the movable objects intended to support various human activities such as seating and sleeping in beds, to hold objects at a convenient height for work using horizontal surfaces above the ground, or to store things...
, stained glass
Stained glass
The term stained glass can refer to coloured glass as a material or to works produced from it. Throughout its thousand-year history, the term has been applied almost exclusively to the windows of churches and other significant buildings...
windows and decorative panels. Her beautiful watercolor renderings of buildings and landscapes became known as a staple of Wright's style, though she was never given credit by the famous architect. Over a century later she would be known as one of the greatest delineators of the architecture field, but during her life her talent was seen as only an extention of the work done by male architects. She would be associated with Wright's studio for almost fifteen years and was an important contributor to his reputation, particularly for the influential Wasmuth Portfolio
Wasmuth Portfolio
The Wasmuth portfolio is a two-volume folio of 100 lithographs of the work of the American architect Frank Lloyd Wright .Titled Ausgeführte Bauten und Entwürfe von Frank Lloyd Wright, it was published in Germany in 1910 by the Berlin publisher Ernst Wasmuth, with an accompanying monograph by Wright...
, for which Mahony created more than half of the numerous renderings. Architectural writer Reyner Banham
Reyner Banham
Peter Reyner Banham was a prolific architectural critic and writer best known for his 1960 theoretical treatise Theory and Design in the First Machine Age and for his 1971 book Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four Ecologies...
called her the "greatest architectural delineator of her generation". Her rendering of the K. C. DeRhodes House
K. C. DeRhodes House
The K. C. DeRhodes House is a classic 1906 Frank Lloyd Wright Prairie style home located at 715 West Washington Avenue in South Bend, Indiana. The home has been carefully restored by its current owners over more than two decades and remains in private ownership. It is one of two Wright homes in...
in South Bend, Indiana
South Bend, Indiana
The city of South Bend is the county seat of St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States, on the St. Joseph River near its southernmost bend, from which it derives its name. As of the 2010 Census, the city had a total of 101,168 residents; its Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 316,663...
was praised by Wright upon its completion and by many critics.
Wright understated the contributions of others of the Prairie School
Prairie School
Prairie School was a late 19th and early 20th century architectural style, most common to the Midwestern United States.The works of the Prairie School architects are usually marked by horizontal lines, flat or hipped roofs with broad overhanging eaves, windows grouped in horizontal bands,...
, Mahony included. Unfortunately, the views of most architectural historians from the 1950s to 2000 follow Wright's lead. A clear understanding of Marion Mahony’s contribution to the architecture of the Oak Park Studio comes from Wright’s son, John Lloyd Wright, who says that William Drummond
William Drummond
William Drummond or Bill Drummond is the name of:*William Drummond of Hawthornden , Scottish poet, influenced by Spenser; best known for illustrated essay, Cypresse Grove...
, Francis Barry Byrne
Barry Byrne
Francis Barry Byrne was initially a member of the group of architects known as the Prairie School. After the demise of the Prairie School about 1914-16, Byrne continued as a successful architect by developing his own personal style.-Biography:Francis Barry Byrne was born and raised in Chicago...
, Walter Burley Griffin
Walter Burley Griffin
Walter Burley Griffin was an American architect and landscape architect, who is best known for his role in designing Canberra, Australia's capital city...
, Albert Chase McArthur
Albert Chase McArthur
Albert Chase McArthur was a Prairie School architect, and the designer of the Arizona Biltmore Hotel in Phoenix, Arizona.-Early years:...
, Marion Mahony, Isabel Roberts
Isabel Roberts
Isabel Roberts was a Prairie School figure, member of the architectural design team in the Oak Park Studio of Frank Lloyd Wright and partner with Ida Annah Ryan in the Orlando, Florida architecture firm, “Ryan and Roberts”. It is fair to say that Roberts is an under-appreciated member of Wright’s...
and George Willis
George Rodney Willis
George Rodney Willis, was an American architect associated with the Prairie School and the Oak Park, Illinois studio of Frank Lloyd Wright who thereafter had a successful career in California and in Texas....
were the draftsmen--the five men and two women who each made valuable contributions to Prairie style architecture for which Wright became famous. During this time Mahony designed the Gerald Mahony Residence (1907) in Elkhart, Indiana
Elkhart, Indiana
Elkhart is a city in Elkhart County, Indiana, United States. The city is located east of South Bend, northwest of Fort Wayne, east of Chicago, and north of Indianapolis...
for her brother and sister-in-law.
When Wright eloped to Europe with Mamah Borthwick Cheney
Mamah Borthwick
Martha "Mamah" Borthwick is primarily noted for her relationship with Frank Lloyd Wright, which ended when she was murdered....
in 1909, he offered the Studio's work to Mahony. She declined. But after Wright had gone, Hermann V. von Holst
Hermann V. von Holst
Hermann V. von Holst was an American architect practicing in Chicago, Illinois and Boca Raton, Florida, from the 1890s through the 1940s, best remembered for agreeing to take on the responsibility of heading up Frank Lloyd Wright’s architectural practice when Wright went off to Europe with Mamah...
, who had taken on Wright's commissions, hired Mahony with the stipulation that she would have control of design. In this capacity, Mahony was the architect for a number of commissions Wright had abandoned. Two examples were the first (unbuilt) design for Henry Ford
Henry Ford
Henry Ford was an American industrialist, the founder of the Ford Motor Company, and sponsor of the development of the assembly line technique of mass production. His introduction of the Model T automobile revolutionized transportation and American industry...
's Dearborn
Dearborn, Michigan
-Economy:Ford Motor Company has its world headquarters in Dearborn. In addition its Dearborn campus contains many research, testing, finance and some production facilities. Ford Land controls the numerous properties owned by Ford including sales and leasing to unrelated businesses such as the...
mansion, Fair Lane
Fair Lane
Fair Lane was the name of the estate of Ford Motor Company founder Henry Ford and his wife Clara Ford in Dearborn, Michigan, in the United States. It was named after an area in County Cork in Ireland where Ford's adoptive grandfather, Patrick Ahern, was born...
and the Amberg House in Grand Rapids, Michigan
Grand Rapids, Michigan
Grand Rapids is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan. The city is located on the Grand River about 40 miles east of Lake Michigan. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 188,040. In 2010, the Grand Rapids metropolitan area had a population of 774,160 and a combined statistical area, Grand...
.
Mahony recommended Griffin to von Holst to develop landscaping for the area surrounding the three houses commissioned from Wright in Decatur, Illinois. Mahony and Griffin worked on the Decatur project before their marriage. After their marriage, Mahony worked in Griffin's practice. A Walter Burley Griffin/Marion Mahony designed development that is home to an outstanding collection of Prairie School dwellings, Rock Crest Rock Glen in Mason City, Iowa
Mason City, Iowa
Mason City is the county seat of Cerro Gordo County, Iowa, United States. The population was 28,079 in the 2010 census, a decline from 29,172 in the 2000 census. The Mason City Micropolitan Statistical Area includes all of Cerro Gordo and Worth counties....
, is seen as their most dramatic American design development of the decade. It is the largest collection of Prairie Style homes surrounding a natural setting.
Mahony and Walter Burley Griffin
Walter Burley Griffin
Walter Burley Griffin was an American architect and landscape architect, who is best known for his role in designing Canberra, Australia's capital city...
married in 1911, a partnership that lasted 28 years. Griffin was a fellow architect, a fellow ex-employee of Wright, and a leading member of the Prairie School
Prairie School
Prairie School was a late 19th and early 20th century architectural style, most common to the Midwestern United States.The works of the Prairie School architects are usually marked by horizontal lines, flat or hipped roofs with broad overhanging eaves, windows grouped in horizontal bands,...
of architecture
Architecture
Architecture is both the process and product of planning, designing and construction. Architectural works, in the material form of buildings, are often perceived as cultural and political symbols and as works of art...
. Marion's watercolor perspectives of Walter's design for Canberra
Canberra
Canberra is the capital city of Australia. With a population of over 345,000, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory , south-west of Sydney, and north-east of Melbourne...
, the new Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n capital, were instrumental in securing first prize in the international competition for the plan of the city. In 1914 the couple moved to Australia to oversee the building of Canberra. Marion managed the Sydney office and was responsible for the design of their private commissions. They pioneered the Knitlock construction method, inexactly emulated by Wright in his California textile block houses of the 1920s.
Later the Griffins practiced in India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
and, in less than a year, Mahony oversaw the design of over one hundred Prairie School influenced buildings there. Walter Griffin died in India in 1937 of peritonitis following a cholecystectomy. Mahony then completed their work and returned to the United States. Mahony and Griffin spread the Prairie Style to two continents, far from its origins. She credited Louis Sullivan
Louis Sullivan
Louis Henri Sullivan was an American architect, and has been called the "father of skyscrapers" and "father of modernism" He is considered by many as the creator of the modern skyscraper, was an influential architect and critic of the Chicago School, was a mentor to Frank Lloyd Wright, and an...
as the impetus for the Prairie School philosophy. She considered Wright's habit of taking credit for the movement explained its early death, in the United States.
Death
Marion Mahony Griffin died in Chicago, aged 90. Though she lived 24 years after her husband's death, she did little in her elderly years to further advance her own architectural career. "The one time she addressed the Illinois Society of Architects, she made no mention of her work, instead lectured the crowd on anthroposophy, a philosophy of spiritual knowledge developed by Rudolf Steiner."She is buried in Graceland Cemetery
Graceland Cemetery
Graceland Cemetery is a large Victorian era cemetery located in the north side community area of Uptown, in the city of Chicago, Illinois, USA. Established in 1860, its main entrance is at the intersection of Clark Street and Irving Park Road...
, Irving Park Road & Clark Street, Chicago, with other noted architects: David Adler
David Adler
David Adler was a prolific architect, designing over 200 buildings...
, Louis Sullivan
Louis Sullivan
Louis Henri Sullivan was an American architect, and has been called the "father of skyscrapers" and "father of modernism" He is considered by many as the creator of the modern skyscraper, was an influential architect and critic of the Chicago School, was a mentor to Frank Lloyd Wright, and an...
, Daniel H. Burnham, Bruce Goff
Bruce Goff
Bruce Alonzo Goff was an American architect distinguished by his organic, eclectic, and often flamboyant designs for houses and other buildings in Oklahoma and elsewhere.-Early years:...
, William Holabird
William Holabird
William Holabird was an American architect.Holabird studied at the United States Military Academy at West Point but resigned and moved to Chicago, where he later got married. He worked for William Le Baron Jenney...
, Howard Van Doren Shaw
Howard Van Doren Shaw
Howard Van Doren Shaw was an American architect. He became one of the best-known architects of his generation in the Chicago area.-Early life and career:...
and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was a German architect. He is commonly referred to and addressed as Mies, his surname....
.
Architectural work attributable in part or in full to Marion Mahony Griffin (partial listing)
- All Souls Church (demolished), Evanston, IllinoisEvanston, IllinoisEvanston is a suburban municipality in Cook County, Illinois 12 miles north of downtown Chicago, bordering Chicago to the south, Skokie to the west, and Wilmette to the north, with an estimated population of 74,360 as of 2003. It is one of the North Shore communities that adjoin Lake Michigan...
– 1901 - The Gerald and Hattie Mahony Residence (demolished), Elkhart, IndianaElkhart, IndianaElkhart is a city in Elkhart County, Indiana, United States. The city is located east of South Bend, northwest of Fort Wayne, east of Chicago, and north of Indianapolis...
- 1907 - David Amberg Residence, 505 College Avenue SE, Grand Rapids, MichiganGrand Rapids, MichiganGrand Rapids is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan. The city is located on the Grand River about 40 miles east of Lake Michigan. As of the 2010 census, the city population was 188,040. In 2010, the Grand Rapids metropolitan area had a population of 774,160 and a combined statistical area, Grand...
- 1909 - Edward P. Irving Residence, 2 Millikin Place, Decatur, IllinoisDecatur, IllinoisDecatur is the largest city and the county seat of Macon County in the U.S. state of Illinois. The city, sometimes called "the Soybean Capital of the World", was founded in 1823 and is located along the Sangamon River and Lake Decatur in Central Illinois. In 2000 the city population was 81,500,...
- 1909 - Robert Mueller Residence, 1 Millikin Place, Decatur, IllinoisDecatur, IllinoisDecatur is the largest city and the county seat of Macon County in the U.S. state of Illinois. The city, sometimes called "the Soybean Capital of the World", was founded in 1823 and is located along the Sangamon River and Lake Decatur in Central Illinois. In 2000 the city population was 81,500,...
- 1909 - Adolph Mueller Residence, 4 Millikin Place, Decatur, IllinoisDecatur, IllinoisDecatur is the largest city and the county seat of Macon County in the U.S. state of Illinois. The city, sometimes called "the Soybean Capital of the World", was founded in 1823 and is located along the Sangamon River and Lake Decatur in Central Illinois. In 2000 the city population was 81,500,...
- 1910 - Niles Club Company, Club House, Niles, MichiganNiles, MichiganNiles is a city in Berrien and Cass counties in the U.S. state of Michigan, near South Bend, Indiana. The population was 11,600 at the 2010 census. It is the greater populated of two principal cities of and included in the Niles-Benton Harbor, Michigan Metropolitan Statistical Area, which has a...
- 1911 - Henry Ford Residence “FairLane” (unbuilt initial design; 1913)
- Koehne House (demolished 1974), Palm Beach, FloridaPalm Beach, FloridaThe Town of Palm Beach is an incorporated town in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. The Intracoastal Waterway separates it from the neighboring cities of West Palm Beach and Lake Worth...
- 1914 - Cooley Residence, Grand St. at Texas Avenue, Monroe, LouisianaMonroe, LouisianaMonroe is a city in and the parish seat of Ouachita Parish, Louisiana, United States. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 53,107, making it the eighth largest city in Louisiana. A July 1, 2007, United States Census Bureau estimate placed the population at 51,208, but 51,636...
- Fern Room, Cafe Australia, Melbourne, Australia - 1916
- Capitol Theatre, Swanston Street, Melbourne, Australia – 1921-23
- "Stokesay", residence of Mr. & Mrs. Onians, 289 Nepean Highway, Seaford, VictoriaSeaford, VictoriaSeaford is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 36 km south-east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Frankston...
, Australia - 1925 - Ellen Mower Residence, 12 The Rampart, Castlecrag, SydneySydneySydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
, New South WalesNew South WalesNew South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
- 1926 - Creswick Residence, Castlecrag, SydneySydneySydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
, New South WalesNew South WalesNew South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...
, AustraliaAustraliaAustralia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
- 1926 - S.R. Salter Residence (Knitlock construction), Toorak, VictoriaToorak, VictoriaToorak is a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 5 km south-east from Melbourne's central business district located on a rise on the south side of a bend in the Yarra River. Its Local Government Area is the City of Stonnington...
, Australia - 1927 - Vaughan Griffin Residence, 52 Darebin St., Heidelberg, VictoriaHeidelberg, VictoriaHeidelberg is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 11 km north-east from Melbourne's central business district. Its Local Government Area is the City of Banyule....
, Australia - 1927
Sources
- Paul Kruty. "Griffin, Marion Lucy Mahony", American National Biography Online, February 2000.
- Brooks, H. Allen, Frank Lloyd Wright and the Prairie School, Braziller (in association with the Cooper-Hewitt Museum), New York 1984; ISBN 0807610844
- Brooks, H. Allen, The Prairie School, W.W. Norton, New York 2006; ISBN 039373191X
- Brooks, H. Allen (editor), Prairie School Architecture: Studies from "The Western Architect", University of Toronto Press, Toronto & Buffalo 1975; ISBN 0802021387
- Brooks, H. Allen, The Prairie School: Frank Lloyd Wright and his Midwest Contemporaries, University of Toronto Press, Toronto 1972; ISBN 0802052517
- Waldheim, Charles, Katerina Rüedi, Katerina Ruedi Ray; Chicago Architecture: Histories, Revisions, Alternatives, University of Chicago Press, 2005; ISBN 0226870383, ISBN9780226870380
- Wood, Debora (editor), Marion Mahony Griffin: Drawing the Form of Nature, Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art and Northwestern University Press, Evanston, Illinois 2005; ISBN 0-8101-2357-6
External links
- http://www.artic.edu/magicofamerica/Marion Mahony Griffin, Digital Projects, New-York Historical SocietyNew-York Historical SocietyThe New-York Historical Society is an American history museum and library located in New York City at the corner of 77th Street and Central Park West in Manhattan. Founded in 1804 as New York's first museum, the New-York Historical Society presents exhibitions, public programs and research that...
] - About Mahony's contribution as an artist and architect
- Biographical notes at MIT
- Marion Mahony Griffin: Drawing the Form of Nature an exhibition of Mahony Griffin’s graphic art at the Block Museum, Northwestern University, United States of America
- The Magic of America: Electronic Edition online version of Marion Mahony Griffin's unpublished manuscript, made available through the Art Institute of ChicagoArt Institute of ChicagoThe School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...
- "Rediscovering a Heroine of Chicago Architecture", New York Times, January 1, 2008