Recently the public radio station WBEZ broadcast a feature on "Sex and Architecture." We thought that another approach should be considered. I am not aware of any architect-designed structure in Chicago in which sex or sex appeal was the foremost intention of the architect. But there definitely are instances where sex and architecture cross paths or sex is an aspect of a larger architectural program or endeavor. One place where Chicago architecture and sex intersect is the year 1856. It is the year when both Louis Sullivan, the father of the modern skyscraper, and Sigmund Freud, the father of modern psychology, were born. This linking may seem a little farfetched at first but there were a couple of important ideas that came out of Vienna and/or were widely popular there that are relevant to this question. These ideas can be helpful in or even fundamental to understanding Sullivan`s work, its sensual aspects and create a thread that we carry down through the sartorial designs of Mies van der Rohe to the recent, rather puckish Prada Store and the new, slick Sofitel. The first is the idea of the "heavy dress." The Viennese architect Gottfried Semper argued that since post and beam structural systems and the guts of every building were essentially the same, what the architect did was choose the style of its clothing or drape. The "heavy dress" is what differentiated one building from another. And "dress`, a sexy dress, is a way to reveal and conceal, all the while leaving something to the imagination. The pedimental sculpture of the Parthenon from the 5th century BC in the British Museum speaks volumes on this. Having a little clothing on is much sexier than wearing nothing at all. The fabric hugs the figures` curves like a second skin inviting your caress {while strictly forbidden and not recommended, if you cannot control yourself make sure the Museum Guard isn`t looking!}. Its folds create shadow and rhythm, capturing your attention, without revealing too much. They still elicit a sensual response today. The second idea is a dichotomy penned by Nietzsche that was very popular in fin de siecle Vienna. Nietzsche spoke of two fundamental opposites: the need to order or rationalize versus the need to embellish or ornate. This is played out in Sullivan`s work -- much of his output is a structural frame that has been been embellished with ornament. Think of the overgrown, abundant foliage of his cast iron windows at Carson, Pirie, Scott, or his lush terracotta frames of the Krause Music Store on North Lincoln Avenue. Or think of Wright`s description of his primary duty when hired by Sullivan as a draftsman of ornament -- first he drew the underlying geometry, say a circle and a rotated square, with a T-square and a compass and then he applied lush ornament calling it a crime. And, to put this into context, at that time so was everything in the bedroom but the missionary position with the lights on... Nietzsche`s aphorism "Without Art we perish from Truth" is instructive in describing the oeuvre of the architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Mies`s output is arguably the non plus ultra of sensual 20th century architecture. This maybe hard to believe in Chicago but Mies` European work is known for its rich fabrics and sartorial finishes. When Mies came into his own in 1920`s Berlin, there were 2 major movements in architecture: historicsm or those who made NeoGothic and Neoclassal buildings with traditional materials like marble and masonry attached to their steel frames in the manner of Gottfried Semper`s "heavy dress" and Die Sachlichkeit or the New Objectivity. The latter used industrial methods and man-made materials to create inexpensive housing for the masses. Mies took the materials used by the historicists, the rich stones, sumptuous leathers, and the polished surfaces and combined them with the industrial methods and forms of the Die Neue Sachl
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