Chicago Tribune from Chicago, Illinois • 152

1 aygaroiflllTO Architecture Verdon and Rivera triumph in "CHICAGO" 'Chippendale9 architecture-near-kitsch or top drawer? "Gwen Verdon and Chita Rivera the great Broadway show dancers give the production a new, professional edge. Jerry OrbaCh iS Still perfect." -Linda Winer, Tribune "Verdon, Rivera jazz up 'CHICAGO'. The word is and terrific. Mary McCarty is a welcome, strong addition." uienna syse. sun-1 inies 1 4 1 mmm mmm 4J By Paul Gapp Architecture Critic PHILIP JOHNSON has stood American architecture on its ear with his plans for a New York skyscraper that resembles a Chippendale dresser.

Some designers are privately furious about the recently announced building because they see it as an impediment to the orderly development of a "postmodern" architecture. Others perceive it as an amusing thumb of-the-nose at orthodoxy, if not an outright put-on. Many are jealous because Johnson is getting so much attention. Most of the rest perhaps don't know what to think. Johnson, you must understand, is no zany young upstart.

At 71, he is considered by many to be the dean of American architecture. He has a highly distinguished track record, by most standards, and is credited with being a formidable scholar as well. It is also necessary to recall that for decades. Johnson was the nation's most articulate exponent of the International Style brought to its less-is-more epitome by Mies van der Rohe. In truth, Johnson defined and named the glass box school of architecture when, in 1932, he coauthored (with Henry-Russell Hitchcock) a book titled "The International Style." Some years later, Johnson teamed with Mies to design New York's renowned Seagram Building.

But if Mies were alive today, he would unquestionably regard the Chippendale building with nothing less than contempt and loathing because it is the antithesis of everything he believed in. So why has Johnson made such a startling break with his past beliefs, and how influential will his wild new skyscraper turn out to be? First, let us examine the design of the 36-story structure, to be build in midtown Manhattan as the corporate headquarters of the American Telephone and Telegraph Co. Its rather inordinatley high cost of $110 million is attributed in part to the selection of a rough-textured granite that will sheathe its steel frame. Windows will pierce only 32 per cent of the walls, an energy-saving factor of considerable consequence. Unlike most modern high rises, this one has an easily recognizable bottom, a middle, and a top.

This pleasingly logical organization of elements was invented in the late 19th Century, when skyscrapers were coming into their own, but was abandoned by glass box modernists after World War II. The bottom of the building is a hybrid conibira-tion of old and new. It has been pointed out. for example, that the 80-foot-tall main entranceway arch and its accompanying ensemble of other elements is reminiscent of the Church of St. Andrea in Mantua, designed by Leone Battista Alberti in the 15th Century.

But the rest of the base is strictly 1978. A glass-canopied arcade, a covered plaza, and a glass-enclosed lobby will reassure visitors that they have. not been caught in a Renaissance time warp. The "middle" of the building, housing offices for 1.000 persons, presents interestingly rhythmic facades resulting from pleasing pier and mullion sequences. In this respect, it echoes nothing so much as skyscrapers of the 1920s.

It is at the top of the structure where Johnson really indulged himself. What appear to be Doric-styled columns appear near the summit; and then comes that incredibJe scooped-out pediment that gives the skyscraper its Chippendale look. Had Johnson eschewed this final fillip in favor of a conventional flat top, he might not have caused a national uproar in the architectural community. But when he took that last step he surpassed mere neo-classicism and made instant history. Any formal credit list for the structure must include Johnson's partner, John Burgee, with Harry' Simmons as associate architect.

Make no mistake, however: this is Johnson's building. No other architect in the nation, probably, would stake'his reputation on such an iconoclastic design and get a conservative client such as to accept it. Perhaps we should not be totally surprised. Johnson had long been -saying it was time for architecture to move out in fresh directions. He gave us a foretaste of his breakaway when he slanted the tops of the Pennzoil Plaza twin towers in Houston.

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