The ARCHITECT and HIS TRADITIONS
BY C. H. BLACKALL, F. A. I. A.
T
HERE is before me on my table a folder of a large New York Bond Corporation. The list of the directors is headed by the principal partner of a firm of architects whose reputation is world-wide and who easily rank among the very best. The list also includes the senior member of a firm of architects which through two generations has stood for the highest ideals and the most strict professional dealing. On the advisory staff there are in addition six very well known architects, and the president of the corporation named a dozen or more leading New York architects as being among his stockholders. All of these men enjoy a good and an honorable practice. Their names lend weight and dignity to the Board, and their presence in such an organization is admittedly indicative of their desire to share in the profits which the accumulation of capital can afford to aid in promotion of buildings in which they are interested.
In reading this circular, one cannot but recall the attitude of the profession towards promotion and banking only a very few years ago. Just before the war I was visited by a Chicago architect, a man of a great deal of native ability, who had also inherited quite a fortune from his ancestors and had very materially added to that income by a large and lucrative practice. He told me he was just erecting himself a building to be occupied entirely by himself, with a trust company which he would control in the first story, his offices for promotion, for management and care of real estate, etc., on the second story and his architectural and supervising department in a high third story. I well remember the architectural qualms with which I received this statement, so at variance with the rigid professional attitude that marked the profession up to a very short time ago, and when the tale was repeated to some of my fellow architects in Boston, they raised their eyebrows and shrugged their shoulders, deprecating the advent of business tactics into the profession of architecture, and yet today, barely ten years thereafter, I find our very best architects actively engaged in promotion of building operations, in management of same, and in quite extensive banking operations.
I received a visit a few days since from a British architect who is in this country to study our methods and to acquaint himself with the American point of view towards the architect and his responsibilities and opportunities. He had become somewhat familiar with the extent to which the architect is now a factor in the organization of building operations, and took occasion to lament the absence of a business sense among the English
architects, declaring that the professional attitude there is one of outspoken opposition to any attempt on the part of an architect to act as a business adviser or administrator, or to have any part in finances, or so-called practical details of the profession, with the consequence, he put it, that architecture in many cases becomes a mere case of frontispiece, or an academic plan, and the architect is supposed to know nothing about, income, capitalization or carrying expenses. He was in this country with the distinct purpose of introducing American methods of financing and organization into the practice of the English architects.
Now, what is the answer? We seem to have thrown away the traditions of our fathers. To be sure, Bulfinch, than whom no one has been more honored in American architecture, was a very prominent man in politics, in administrations and apparently a skillful operator within the possibilities of the time in what we would call real estate operations, but be was somewhat of an exception, and up to within ten years ago the American Institute of Architects looked askance at anything that, savored of commercialism in commerce, as if commerce were a disgrace, and as if the architect should deliberately shut his eyes to the fact, that the business world has moved quite as much as the artistic. Has the profession gained or lost by opening the doors for such wide possibilities ? Will the possibilities of our descendants be better or worse because of the latitude which we now allow ourselves, whether admitted or denied ? I believe the fact is beyond question that speculative methods of organization and promotion are no longer associated with the unprofessional architect, or the man who has come in through the back way, or who has no idea of the art of architecture*, but, as is shown by the circular above referred to, the conditions imposed upon the architect today requiring him to know the business side of his calling and to know how to help his clients to the best business solution of a problem, and how to help him even finance and operate his building, are duties and rights which are assumed and carried out by those whom we are glad to call our best architects. It is no longer thought desirable for an architect to immerse himself in the unapproachable attitude of what we used, with pride, to call a professional man, for today the architect has become an integral factor in nearly all of the large building promotion schemes. He. is called in very often first, and it may be said incidentally it is a good deal better for the scheme if he is admitted on the ground floor. His advice is sought not only by builders,
BY C. H. BLACKALL, F. A. I. A.
T
HERE is before me on my table a folder of a large New York Bond Corporation. The list of the directors is headed by the principal partner of a firm of architects whose reputation is world-wide and who easily rank among the very best. The list also includes the senior member of a firm of architects which through two generations has stood for the highest ideals and the most strict professional dealing. On the advisory staff there are in addition six very well known architects, and the president of the corporation named a dozen or more leading New York architects as being among his stockholders. All of these men enjoy a good and an honorable practice. Their names lend weight and dignity to the Board, and their presence in such an organization is admittedly indicative of their desire to share in the profits which the accumulation of capital can afford to aid in promotion of buildings in which they are interested.
In reading this circular, one cannot but recall the attitude of the profession towards promotion and banking only a very few years ago. Just before the war I was visited by a Chicago architect, a man of a great deal of native ability, who had also inherited quite a fortune from his ancestors and had very materially added to that income by a large and lucrative practice. He told me he was just erecting himself a building to be occupied entirely by himself, with a trust company which he would control in the first story, his offices for promotion, for management and care of real estate, etc., on the second story and his architectural and supervising department in a high third story. I well remember the architectural qualms with which I received this statement, so at variance with the rigid professional attitude that marked the profession up to a very short time ago, and when the tale was repeated to some of my fellow architects in Boston, they raised their eyebrows and shrugged their shoulders, deprecating the advent of business tactics into the profession of architecture, and yet today, barely ten years thereafter, I find our very best architects actively engaged in promotion of building operations, in management of same, and in quite extensive banking operations.
I received a visit a few days since from a British architect who is in this country to study our methods and to acquaint himself with the American point of view towards the architect and his responsibilities and opportunities. He had become somewhat familiar with the extent to which the architect is now a factor in the organization of building operations, and took occasion to lament the absence of a business sense among the English
architects, declaring that the professional attitude there is one of outspoken opposition to any attempt on the part of an architect to act as a business adviser or administrator, or to have any part in finances, or so-called practical details of the profession, with the consequence, he put it, that architecture in many cases becomes a mere case of frontispiece, or an academic plan, and the architect is supposed to know nothing about, income, capitalization or carrying expenses. He was in this country with the distinct purpose of introducing American methods of financing and organization into the practice of the English architects.
Now, what is the answer? We seem to have thrown away the traditions of our fathers. To be sure, Bulfinch, than whom no one has been more honored in American architecture, was a very prominent man in politics, in administrations and apparently a skillful operator within the possibilities of the time in what we would call real estate operations, but be was somewhat of an exception, and up to within ten years ago the American Institute of Architects looked askance at anything that, savored of commercialism in commerce, as if commerce were a disgrace, and as if the architect should deliberately shut his eyes to the fact, that the business world has moved quite as much as the artistic. Has the profession gained or lost by opening the doors for such wide possibilities ? Will the possibilities of our descendants be better or worse because of the latitude which we now allow ourselves, whether admitted or denied ? I believe the fact is beyond question that speculative methods of organization and promotion are no longer associated with the unprofessional architect, or the man who has come in through the back way, or who has no idea of the art of architecture*, but, as is shown by the circular above referred to, the conditions imposed upon the architect today requiring him to know the business side of his calling and to know how to help his clients to the best business solution of a problem, and how to help him even finance and operate his building, are duties and rights which are assumed and carried out by those whom we are glad to call our best architects. It is no longer thought desirable for an architect to immerse himself in the unapproachable attitude of what we used, with pride, to call a professional man, for today the architect has become an integral factor in nearly all of the large building promotion schemes. He. is called in very often first, and it may be said incidentally it is a good deal better for the scheme if he is admitted on the ground floor. His advice is sought not only by builders,