Monday, January 7, 2019

The Most Iconic Building in Every State in America




ARCHITECTURE

The Most Iconic Building in Every State in America

From skyscrapers to private homes, these landmarks should be on your must-see list
Architecture in the United States couldn’t be more varied, from historic structures dating back to the colonial days to postmodern masterpieces—not to mention everything in between. While there are hundreds of landmark buildings across the country, we’re picking the most iconic one from each and every state that range from New York’s legendary Empire State Building to the quirky Corn Palace in Mitchell, South Dakota.
Photo: Getty Images

Alabama: Alabama State Capitol, Montgomery

Completed in 1851 after the original structure burned down, the Greek Revival–style Alabama State Capitol temporarily served as the Confederate capitol building in 1861. Architect Barachias Holt designed the structure, and African-American engineer Horace King completed the building’s iconic spiral staircase.
Photo: Getty Images

Alaska: University of Alaska Museum of the North, Fairbanks

Architect Joan Soranno of GDM/HGA designed this modernist museum building in 2005. It houses a collection of more than 1.5 million objects related to the cultural and biological history of the region.
Photo: Getty Images

Arizona: Taliesin West, Scottsdale

Frank Lloyd Wright established Taliesin West in 1937, retreating to the Arizona desert to escape the harsh winters of Wisconsin, where he lived in the summers. The campus is still home to an active architecture school, but the public can take guided tours of the structures and grounds.
Photo: Getty Images

Arkansas: Thorncrown Chapel, Eureka Springs

Arkansan Jim Reed completed this chapel, his dream project, in 1980. The glass-and-wood building was named the 1981 American Institute of Architects Design of the Year, and in 2006 the same organization awarded it the Twenty-Five Year Award.
Photo: Getty Images

California: Walt Disney Concert Hall, Los Angeles

California has an incredible architectural legacy, from the midcentury to Spanish Mission–style designs. Frank Gehry’s 2003 Walt Disney Concert Hall ushered in a new era of architecture to L.A., adding the architect’s signature metallic undulations to the downtown skyline.
Photo: Getty Images

Colorado: Air Force Academy Cadet Chapel, Colorado Springs

The SOM-designed chapel, which opened in 1963, is the most-visited man-made attraction in Colorado. Its 17 white geometric spires reach a height of 150 feet.
Photo: Getty Images

Connecticut: Glass House, New Canaan

Philip Johnson’s seminal Glass House was built in 1949, and the architect used it as a weekend retreat until his death in 2005. The entire National Trust for Historic Preservation Site comprises 49 acres and 14 buildings.
Photo: WikiMedia

Delaware: The Grand Opera House, Wilmington

This 1871 opera house was designed by Thomas Dixon as a Masonic Temple and an auditorium, hosting the likes of Ethel Barrymore and John Philip Sousa. It fell into disrepair in the 1960s, but a renovation in 1973 gave the theater a new life.
Photo: Flickr

Florida: The Fontainebleau Hotel, Miami Beach

South Beach is known for its neon-lit Art Deco buildings, but head a bit farther north and you’ll find the grand dame of them all—Morris Lapidus’s Fontainebleau. The hotel opened in 1954 and was the most luxurious property in Miami.
Photo: Getty Images

Georgia: Flatiron Building, Atlanta

Atlanta’s own Flatiron Building, officially called the English-American Building, was actually built five years before New York’s, in 1897. Designed by architect Bradford Gilbert, the 11-story stucture is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Photo: Getty Images

Hawaii: USS Arizona Memorial, Honolulu

The Alfred Preis–designed building honoring the people who died in the attack on Pearl Harbor straddles its namesake ship in the middle of the water. Some two million people visit this monument each year.
Photo: Getty Images

Idaho: Idaho State Capitol, Boise

Architects John E. Tourtellotte and Charles Hummel were tasked with designing the capitol building for Idaho 15 years after it became a state, starting construction in 1902 and completing the main building in 1912 and the wings in 1920.
Photo: Getty Images

Illinois: The Willis Tower, Chicago

The 1973-built Willis Tower, formerly known as the Sears Tower, is the anchor point of Chicago’s skyline. It was the tallest building in the world for 25 years, from 1973 to 1998. In order to maximize space and efficiency, architecture firm SOM employed the use of the bundled tube structure, designed by engineer Fazlur Rahman Khan.
Photo: Getty Images

Indiana: The Atheneum, New Harmony

The small town of New Harmony, Indiana, which was established as a utopia by Robert Owen in 1925, has a welcome center designed by architect Richard Meier. The all-white building has won multiple awards, including the AIA’s Twenty-Five Year Award in 2008.
Photo: Getty Images

Iowa: Iowa State Capitol, Des Moines

The Iowa State Capitol has not one, but five impressive domes, originally designed by architects John C. Cochrane and Alfred H. Piquenard, though the project changed hands several times before it was finished in 1886.
Photo: Getty Images

Kansas: Kansas State Capitol, Topeka

Standing at 304 feet tall, the Kansas State Capitol dome is taller than the United States Capitol dome by 16 feet. Architect Edward Townsend Mix designed the structure to be built with local limestone—it took 37 years to complete the project, with construction ending in 1903.
Photo: WikiMedia

Kentucky: Churchill Downs, Louisville

The home of the famous Kentucky Derby, the Churchill Downs racetrack is known for the Twin Spires atop the grandstand, which were designed by architect Joseph Dominic Baldez in 1895.
Photo: Getty Images

Louisiana: St. Louis Cathedral, New Orleans

Worshippers have been visiting the site of the St. Louis Cathedral since 1727, when the first church on the site was completed, making it the oldest Roman Catholic cathedral in contiguous service in the U.S. The current structure was built in the 1850s.
Photo: Getty Images

Maine: Portland Observatory, Portland

Built in 1807, this octagonal lighthouse-shaped tower was used to signal ships coming into the Portland Harbor. It remained active until 1923, when the two-way radio was invented, and today it serves as a museum.
Photo: Getty Images

Maryland: George Peabody Library, Baltimore

One of the most beautiful university libraries in the world, the George Peabody Library at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore has a five-tiered atrium lined with books. Local architect Edmund G. Lind completed the project in 1878.
Photo: Getty Images

Massachusetts: Trinity Church, Boston

While its parish was established in 1733, the current Trinity Church was built by Henry Hobson Richardson in the 1870s. It’s one of the finest examples of Richardsonian Romanesque, a style pioneered by the eponymous architect that typically featured heavy arches and rough stone.
Photo: Getty Images

Michigan: Fisher Building, Detroit

Albert Kahn designed this 1928 Art Deco skyscraper in Detroit for the Fisher brothers, who, like many others in Detroit, were made rich by the automobile industry. The dazzling building features more than 40 kinds of marble, gold-leaf frescoes, and polychromatic mosaics.
Photo: Getty Images

Minnesota: Cathedral of Saint Paul, St. Paul

The elaborate Cathedral of Saint Paul is the fourth church to be built on the site, completed in 1915. It was designed by Emmanuel Louis Masqueray, who also was the head architect for the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis
Photo: Getty Images

Mississippi: Longwood, Natchez

Local couple Haller and Julia Nutt commissioned architect Samuel Sloan to design an Oriental-style villa. While construction began in 1861, the outbreak of the Civil War halted the project—it was never completed, and the couple lived in the basement of the building.
Photo: Getty Images

Missouri: Gateway Arch, St. Louis

Modernist great Eero Saarinen won a competition to design this monument to America’s Westward Expansion, beating out his father, Eliel. The 630-foot structure is the tallest accessible structure in the state.
Photo: Getty Images

Montana: Cathedral of St. Helena, Helena

Opened in 1914, the Cathedral of St. Helena is modeled after the Votivkirche in Vienna. Architect A.O. Von Herbulis presented two drawings to the church committee, one in the Romanesque style and the other in the Gothic style: The latter was chosen.
Photo: Getty Images

Nebraska: Nebraska State Capitol, Lincoln

Nicknamed the “Tower on the Plains,” the Nebraska State Capitol features a 400-foot tower—the public can access observation decks on the 14th floor (at 245 feet). Architect Bertram Grosvenor Goodhue designed the structure, which opened in 1920.
Photo: Getty Images

Nevada: Luxor Las Vegas

The 4,407-room Luxor hotel in Las Vegas has an unmistakable shape—it’s a hulking mirrored pyramid, a defining form in the landscape of the Strip since 1992, when the hotel opened. It is, of course, named after the Egyptian city.
Photo: Getty Images

New Hampshire: Omni Mount Washington Resort, Bretton Woods

This National Historic Landmark, designed by architect Charles Alling Gifford, is a Gilded Age hotel that opened in 1902. During its construction, 250 Italian craftsmen worked on masonry and woodworking for the project.
Photo: Getty Images

New Jersey: Bell Works, Holmdel

Formerly known as the Bell Labs Holmdel Complex, this 472-acre campus served as a scientific research facility. Eero Saarinen designed the main building, a massive mirrored structure, whose top-down renovation is being overseen by Alexander Gorlin Architects.
Photo: Getty Images

New Mexico: Taos Pueblo

Rather than pick a single structure for New Mexico, we have to name all of the adobe buildings in Taos Pueblo, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The majority of these reddish structures were constructed between 1000 and 1450.
Photo: Getty Images

New York: Empire State Building, New York

Perhaps one of the most famous buildings in the world, the Empire State Building is the flagship of the New York skyline. The Art Deco skyscraper by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon was completed in 1931 and was the tallest building in the world until 1970, when the World Trade Center towers surpassed it.
Photo: Getty Images

North Carolina: Biltmore, Asheville

At 178,926 square feet, the Biltmore Estate is largest privately owned home in the U.S. Built for the famous Vanderbilt family, the mansion was designed by Richard Morris Hunt, who was inspired by French châteaux and English manors.
Photo: Getty Images

North Dakota: Fort Union Trading Post National Historic Site, Williston

This post on the Missouri River was one of the most important in the fur trade in the mid-19th century. Though the original buildings have long since been razed, they’ve been reconstructed based on archaeological evidence.
Photo: Getty Images

Ohio: Longaberger Basket Building, Newark

Not all architecture is meant to be taken seriously. The cheeky former headquarters of the Longaberger Company, which sells baskets, is, well, a basket! The seven-story office building was recently bought by Coon Restoration, which is expected to preserve the landmark.
Photo: Getty Images

Oklahoma: Boston Avenue Methodist Church, Tulsa

This 1929-completed church in Tulsa features elaborate Art Deco detailing, including terracotta sculptures by artist Robert Garrison. The building was based on designs by local art teacher Adah Robinson and architect Bruce Goff of Rush, Endacott and Rush.
Photo: Steve J. Morgan / via WikiMedia

Oregon: Portland Building, Portland

Architecture is oftentimes controversial, and in Oregon, the Portland Building might be the most divisive in the state. Michael Graves designed this postmodern office building, which opened in 1982, and it sparked quite a debate about its aesthetics, with architects being split upon its merits.
Photo: Courtesy Western Pennsylvania Conservancy

Pennsylvania: Fallingwater, Mill Run

Perhaps Frank Lloyd Wright’s most famous work, Fallingwater has been nearly universally praised as one of the most beautiful houses in existence—the AIA voted it the “best all-time work of American architecture” in 1991.
Photo: Getty Images

Rhode Island: The Breakers, Newport

The Vanderbilt family constructed this mansion in the tony town of Newport, a Gilded Age retreat for the wealthiest American families. Architect Richard Morris Hunt designed the exterior, while Jules Allard and Sons and Ogden Codman, Jr. designed the ornate (and sometimes gaudy) interior.
Photo: Getty Images

South Carolina: Drayton Hall, Charleston

Built in the 18th century, this Palladian-style plantation home is one of the best preserved in the country. In fact, the home has never been renovated, and all the original materials still remain.
Photo: Getty Images

South Dakota: Corn Palace, Mitchell

Drawing 500,000 visitors annually, the Corn Palace is a Moorish-style auditorium and event space that’s decorated with a new corn-cob mural on its façade each year. The present building was erected in 1921, but the first Corn Palace, a temporary structure, was built in 1892.
Photo: Getty Images

Tennessee: Ryman Auditorium, Nashville

Originally opened as the Union Gospel Tabernacle, the Ryman Auditorium was home to the Grand Ole Opry from 1943 to 1974. The brick building was designed by architect Hugh Cathcart Thompson.
Photo: Getty Images

Texas: The Alamo Mission, San Antonio

The site of the famous 1836 battle of the Texas Revolution, the Alamo Mission was built in 1718 to convert native peoples to Christianity, but by the next century it had become a fortress. Much damage was sustained during the battle and subsequent occupation by the Mexican forces, but it was restored in the mid-20th century.
Photo: Getty Images

Utah: Salt Lake Temple, Salt Lake City

The largest temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the Salt Lake Temple was designed by architect Truman O. Angell in a style that merged Gothic and Romanesque details.
Photo: Getty Images

Vermont: Round Church, Richmond

Local blacksmith and carpenter William Rhodes built the 16-sided Round Church to serve five different branches of Protestantism in 1814. It then served as the town hall from 1880 till 1973, and today it’s been preserved and can be rented out for weddings.
Photo: Getty Images

Virginia: The Pentagon, Arlington

At 6.5 million square feet, the Pentagon is the world’s largest office building, housing the U.S. Department of Defense. Architect George Bergstrom designed the structure to resemble historic star forts.
Photo: Getty Images

Washington: The Space Needle, Seattle

Designed by John Graham & Company for the 1962 World’s Fair in Seattle, the Space Needle is manufactured to withstand hurricane-force winds and earthquakes up to a 9.1 on the Richter scale. It’s home to an observation deck and a rotating restaurant
Photo: Getty Images

Washington, D.C.: The White House

The official residence of the sitting U.S. president, designed by James Hoban, has housed all of the country’s leaders except George Washington. The British burned down the original mansion in 1814 during the War of 1812, but it was rebuilt.
Photo: WikiMedia

West Virginia: The Greenbrier, White Sulphur Springs

While Americans had been vacationing in the area since 1778, the current main hotel building was constructed in 1913. Famed decorator Dorothy Draper oversaw a major interior renovation in the mid-20th century, and her protégé, Carleton Varney, is the official Greenbrier designer today.
Photo: Getty Images

Wisconsin: Taliesin, Spring Green

Frank Lloyd Wright’s summer residence—which sits on 600 acres of land he inherited from his mother’s family—is a masterpiece. The estate is home to his private quarters, his studio, and an architecture school.

Wyoming: Atlas Theatre, Cheyenne

Originally home to a candy shop, this 1887 building was converted into a theater by architect William Dubois in 1907. It went through periods of neglect throughout the 20th century but was restored as a community theater in 1971.

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