A perfectly normal part of the modern cityscape, the glass tower is a fairly recent architectural invention. Glass has been around for a long time. The technology needed to build skyscrapers, while newer, has also been around for quite some time. But the combination of the two, into an enormous glass structure, did not arise until 1951. It was then that the Lake Shore Drive Apartments in Chicago (seen above) were completed and ushered in a new era in architecture. The glass tower quickly became a staple of city planning, and today many buildings in cities all over the world are imitations of this building.
The man behind the glass tower was a German-born architect named Ludwig Mies van der Rohe. Born in 1886, he worked in Germany until he was forced to immigrate to the United States in 1937. He took a position at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, and immediately began building large, upward reaching skyscrapers and horizontal, single-space buildings. But the building he most wanted to build was one that he had dreamed of since his days in Germany: a glass skyscraper. In Germany, he was unable to build this structure because of Germany's relatively weak production power. In the United States, however, he found that industrial power would not be an issue. All that was left was a suitable location for the building.
He soon found the perfect site: a plot of land near Lake Michigan, the body of water that had helped Chicago become one of the most popular cities in America during the 19th century. The land selected for the building was shaped like a trapezoid, which forced van der Rohe to rethink his tower. Instead of building a single dominating tower, he instead built two towers in an L-shape to fit in the trapezoid. The facades of the buildings were also made uniform: there is no difference between the sides that face the lake and the others. Soon van der Rohe's towers were copied all over the country and eventually the world, and were used for a variety of purposes. Van der Rohe built other glass towers throughout his career, but the Lake Shore Apartments remained his crowning achievement and the prototype for glass towers the world over.
Final Thoughts...
--The glass tower has only been in existence for ~50 years, but is already one of the most important buildings in city construction.
--Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, in fleeing The National Socialists of his native Germany, came to America and began building prototypical building, the most influential of which were his Lake Shore Apartment buildings.
--Because they can be used for an incredible number of purposes, glass towers quickly became a staple of architecture, and today stand as an integral part of the modern cityscape.
Image Sources
--http://www.architravel.com/architravel/building/860-880-lake-shore-drive-apartments
--http://vincentloy.wordpress.com/2012/03/27/todays-google-doodle-dedicated-to-mies-van-der-rohe-the-father-of-modern-architecture/
--http://draketoulouse.com/2010/07/12/hey-chicago-bps-already-spilling-into-lake-michigan/
dont forget to add pictures!
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