Richard Morris Hunt | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | (1827-10-31)October 31, 1827 Brattleboro, Vermont, U.S. |
| Died | July 31, 1895(1895-07-31) (aged 67) Newport, Rhode Island, U.S. |
| Alma mater | École des Beaux-Arts |
| Occupation | Architect |
| Spouse | Catharine Clinton Howland |
| Buildings | John N. A. Griswold House Chateau-sur-Mer New York Tribune Building William K. Vanderbilt House Marble House Biltmore Estate |
| Signature | |
.png) | |
Richard Morris Hunt (October 31, 1827 – July 31, 1895) was an American architect of the nineteenth century and an eminent figure in the history ofarchitecture of the United States. He helped shapeNew York City with his designs for the 1902 entrance façade and Great Hall of theMetropolitan Museum of Art'sFifth Avenue building, the pedestal of theStatue of Liberty (Liberty Enlightening the World), and manyFifth Avenue mansions since destroyed.[1]
Hunt is also renowned for hisBiltmore Estate, America's largest private house, nearAsheville, North Carolina, and for his elaborate summer cottages inNewport, Rhode Island, which set a new standard of ostentation for the social elite and the newly minted millionaires of theGilded Age.
Hunt was born atBrattleboro, Vermont into the prominentHunt family. His father,Jonathan Hunt, was a lawyer and U.S. congressman, whose own father,Jonathan Hunt, senior, was lieutenant governor of Vermont.[2] Hunt's mother, Jane Maria Leavitt, was the daughter of Thaddeus Leavitt, Jr., a merchant, and a member of the influentialLeavitt family ofSuffield, Connecticut.
Richard Morris Hunt was named for Lieut. Richard Morris, an officer in the U.S. Navy, a son of Hunt's aunt,[3][4] whose husbandLewis Richard Morris was a U.S. Congressman from Vermont and the nephew ofGouverneur Morris, author of large parts of the U.S. Constitution.[5] Hunt was the brother of the Boston painterWilliam Morris Hunt, and the photographer and lawyerLeavitt Hunt.
Following the death of his father in Washington, D.C., in 1832 at the age of 44, Hunt's mother moved her family to New Haven, then in 1837 to New York, and then in the spring of 1838 to Boston.[6] There, Hunt enrolled in theBoston Latin School, while his brother William enrolled inHarvard College. However, in the summer of 1842, William left Harvard, transferring to a school inStockbridge, Massachusetts, while Richard was sent to school in Sandwich, Massachusetts.[7]
In October 1843, out of concern for William's health, Mrs. Hunt and her five children sailed from New York to Europe, eventually settling inRome.[8] There, Hunt studied art, but was encouraged by his mother and brother William to pursue architecture.[9] In May 1844, Hunt enrolled in Mr. Briquet's boarding school inGeneva, and the following year, while continuing to board with Mr. Briquet, arranged to study with the Geneva architect Samuel Darier.[10]
In October 1846, Hunt entered the Parisatelier of the architectHector Lefuel, while studying for the entrance examinations of theÉcole des Beaux-Arts.[11] According to the historianDavid McCullough, "Hunt was the first American to be admitted to the school of architecture at theÉcole des Beaux-Arts – the finest school of architecture in the world – and the subsequent importance of his influence on the architecture of his own country can hardly be overstated."[12]
In 1853, Hunt's mentor Lefuel was placed in charge of the ambitious project ofcompleting the Louvre, following the death of the project's architect,Louis-Tullius-Joachim Visconti. Lefuel engaged Hunt to help supervise the work, and to help design thePavillon de la Bibliothèque ("Library Pavilion"), prominently situated opposite thePalais-Royal.[13] Hunt would later regale the sixteen-year-old future architectLouis Sullivan with stories of his work on theNouveau Louvre in Lefuel'satelier libre.[14]
Hunt spent Christmas 1855 in Paris, after which he returned to the United States. In March 1856, he accepted a position with the architectThomas Ustick Walter helping Walter with the renovation and expansion of theU.S. Capitol, and the following year moved to New York to establish his own practice. Hunt's first substantial project was theTenth Street Studio Building, where he rented space, and where in 1858 he founded the first American architectural school, beginning with a small group of students, includingGeorge B. Post,William Robert Ware,Henry Van Brunt, andFrank Furness.[15] Ware, who was deeply influenced by Hunt, went on to found America's first two university programs in architecture: atMIT in 1866, and atColumbia in 1881.
Hunt's first New York project, a pair of houses on 37th Street forThomas P. Rossiter and his father-in-lawDr. Eleazer Parmly, required Hunt to sue Parmly for non-payment of the supervisory portion of his services. The jury awarded Hunt a 2-1/2% commission, at the time the minimum fee typically charged by architects.[16] According to the editors ofEngineering Magazine, writing in 1896, the case, "helped to establish a uniform system of charges by percentage."[17]
It was in these early years that Hunt suffered his greatest professional setback, the rejection of his formal, classical proposal for the "Scholars' Gate", the entrance to New York'sCentral Park at 60th Street and Fifth Avenue.[18] According to Central Park historian Sarah Cedar Miller, the influential Central Park commissionerAndrew Haswell Green supported Hunt's design, but when the park commissioners adopted it, the park's designers,Frederick Law Olmsted andCalvert Vaux (advocates of a more informal design), protested and resigned their positions with the Central Park project. Hunt's plan was ultimately rejected, and Olmsted and Vaux rejoined the project.[19] Nevertheless, one work of Hunt's can be found in the park, albeit a minor one: therusticatedQuincy granite pedestal on whichJohn Quincy Adams Ward's bronze statueThe Pilgrim stands, onPilgrim Hill overlooking the park'sEast Drive atEast 72nd Street.[20][21][22][23]
Hunt's extroverted personality, a factor in his successful career, is well-documented. After meeting Hunt in 1869 the philosopherRalph Waldo Emerson wrote in his journal of "one remarkable person new to me, Richard Hunt the architect. His conversation was spirited beyond any I remember, loaded with matter, and expressed with the vigour and fury of a member of the Harvard boat or ball club relating the adventures of one of their matches; inspired, meantime, throughout, with fine theories of the possibilities of art."[24] Hunt was said to be popular with his workmen, and legend has it that during a final walk-through of theWilliam K. Vanderbilt house on Fifth Avenue, Hunt discovered a mysterious tent-like object in one of the ballrooms. Investigating, he found it covering a life-sized statue of himself, dressed in stonecutters' clothes, carved in secret as a tribute by the project's stonecutters. Vanderbilt permitted the statue to be placed on the roof over the entrance to the house. Hunt was said to be pragmatic; his son Richard quoted him as having said, "the first thing you've got to remember is that it's your client's money you're spending. Your goal is to achieve the best results by following their wishes. If they want you to build a house upside down standing on its chimney, it's up to you to do it."[25]
Hunt's professional trajectory gained impetus from his extensive social connections atNewport, Rhode Island, the resort where in 1859 Hunt's brother William bought a house. There in 1860 Hunt met the woman he would marry, Catharine Clinton Howland, the daughter ofSamuel Shaw Howland, a New York shipping merchant, and his wife, Joanna Hone.[26]On April 2, 1861, they married at the Church of the Ascension, on Fifth Avenue at Tenth street,[27] and according to a newspaper reporter, the bride brought a dowry to the marriage of $400,000.[28] Many of Hunt's early wood-frame houses, and many of his later more substantial masonry houses, were built at Newport, some of the latter for the Vanderbilts, the family of railroad tycoons with whom Hunt had a long and rewarding relationship.
Beginning in the 1870s, Hunt acquired more substantial commissions, includingNew York'sTribune Building (built 1873–75, one of the earliest buildings with an elevator), and the pedestal of theStatue of Liberty (built 1881–86). Hunt devoted much of his practice to institutional work, including the Theological Library and Marquand Chapel atPrinceton; theFogg Museum of Art atHarvard; and theScroll and Key clubhouse atYale, all of which except the last have been demolished.
Before Hunt'sLenox Library was completed in 1877 on Fifth Avenue, none of his American works were designed in the Beaux-Arts style with which he is usually associated, of which his entrance façade for theMetropolitan Museum of Art'sFifth Avenue building (completed posthumously in 1902) is perhaps the chief example. Late in life he joined the consortium of architects selected to planChicago's 1893World's Columbian Exposition, considered to be an exemplar ofBeaux-Arts design.[29] Hunt's design for the fair's Administration Building won a gold medal from theRoyal Institute of British Architects.
The last surviving New York City buildings entirely by Hunt are the Jackson Square Library and a charity hospital he designed for theAssociation for the Relief of Respectable Aged Indigent Females, completed in 1883 at Amsterdam Avenue between 103rd and 104th Streets. The red-brick building was renovated in the late 20th century and is now ayouth hostel.
The Jackson Square Library, built in 1887 with funds from George Vanderbilt III (Grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt) still exists as well. This particular library — one of the first purpose-built free and open public library buildings in New York (only the Ottendorfer Library on Second Avenue in the East Village is extant and older) — was also one of the first libraries to introduce the innovation of open stacks. This allowed the public to actually pick books off the shelves themselves, rather than having to find a card number in a catalog and ask a librarian to retrieve the book for them, which was to this point standard practice, based in part upon fear of theft. The building continued to operate as a library until it was decommissioned in the early 1960s.[30]
Referring to Hunt's efforts to elevate his chosen profession, the architecture criticPaul Goldberger wrote inThe New York Times that Hunt was "American architecture's first, and in many ways its greatest, statesman."[31] In 1857, Hunt co-founded the New York Society of Architects, which soon became theAmerican Institute of Architects, and from 1888 to 1891 served as the institute's third president. Hunt advocated tirelessly for the improved status of architects, arguing that they should be treated, and paid, as legitimate and respected professionals equivalent to doctors and lawyers. In 1893, Hunt co-founded New York'sMunicipal Art Society, an outgrowth of theCity Beautiful Movement, and served as the society's first president.[32]
Many of Hunt's proteges had successful careers. Among the employees who worked in his firm was the Franco-American architect andÉcole des Beaux-Arts graduateEmmanuel Louis Masqueray who went on to become Chief of Design at theLouisiana Purchase Exposition inSt. Louis. Hunt encouraged artists and craftsmen, frequently employing them to embellish his buildings, most notably the sculptorKarl Bitter who worked on many of Hunt's projects.
Hunt died atNewport, Rhode Island in 1895, and was buried at Newport'sCommon Burying Ground and Island Cemetery. In 1898, the Municipal Art Society commissioned theRichard Morris Hunt Memorial, designed by the architectBruce Price, with a bust of Hunt and two caryatids (one representing art, the other architecture) sculpted byDaniel Chester French.[33] The memorial was installed in the wall of Central Park alongFifth Avenue near 70th Street, across the avenue from Hunt's Lenox Library, which has since been replaced by theFrick Collection.
Following Hunt's death, his sonRichard Howland Hunt continued the practice his father had established,[34] and in 1901 his brother Joseph Howland Hunt joined him to form the successor firm Hunt & Hunt. They completed many of their father's projects, including the 1902 wing ofThe Met Fifth Avenue. The new wing (for which the father, a museum trustee, had made the initial sketches in 1894) included the Fifth Avenue entrance facade, the entrance hall and grand staircase.[35][36][37]
.jpg)
.jpg)
_-_Central_Park%2c_NYC.jpg)
Notes
{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help){{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)Bibliography
Further reading
Media related toRichard Morris Hunt at Wikimedia Commons
| Creators |
|  |
|---|---|---|
| Engineers | ||
| Location |
| |
| Former locations |
| |
| Replicas | ||
| Legacy |
| |
| Related | ||
