Louis Kahn Architect USA, Modern Building Studio, Projects, Office, American Works, Houses

Louis Kahn Architect

Key 20th Century American Architecture Practice: US Architectural Information + Images

post updated March 31, 2024

Key Louis Kahn Buildings

6 May 2016
Yale Center for British Art, Chapel St, New Haven, CT, United States of America
Design: Louis Kahn architect
Yale Center for British Art building by Louis Kahn Architect
photograph : Public Domain, http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1252452
Yale Center for British Art Building

8 Apr 2016
Fine Arts Center, School, and Performing Arts Theater, Fort Wayne, Indiana, USA
Date built: 1959-73
Louis Kahn Campus in Fort Wayne
photo courtesy wikimedia commons
Louis Kahn’s Fine Arts Center, School, and Performing Arts Theater in Indiana – 8 Apr 2016
Regeneration architect sought.

Phillips Exeter Academy Library, Exeter, New Hampshire, USA
Date built: 1967-72
Phillips Exeter Academy Library exterior design by Louis Kahn Architect
photo by Rohmer at en.wikipedia
Phillips Exeter Academy Library
This building has none of the landscape-integrating prairie horizontals of Frank Lloyd Wright’s houses but instead hits you across well-maintained landscape as a massive squat pile of bricks.

Yale University Art Gallery
Design with Polshek Partnership Architects, LLP
Yale University Art Gallery (left to right: Kahn Building, Old Yale Art Gallery, and Street Hall), South Exterior Elevation:
Yale University Art Gallery Building
image © Ennead Architects
Yale Art Gallery
On December 12, 2012, the Yale University Art Gallery celebrates the grand opening of the renovated and expanded museum.

Louis Kahn – Key Projects

Major Developments by Louis Kahn Architect, alphabetical:

Erdman Hall Dormitories & Cafeteria, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, USA
Dates built: 1960-65

Esherick House, Chestnut Hill, Pennsylvania
Dates built: 1959-61

Exeter Library, Exeter, New Hampshire, USA
Dates built: 1967-72

First Unitarian Church, Rochester, New York, USA
Dates built: 1959-67

Institute of Public Administration, Ahmedabad, India
Date built: 1963

Kimbell Museum, Fort Worth, Texas, USA
1967-72

National Assembly, Dacca, Bangladesh
1962-74
The decision to build the National Assembly of Bangladesh in Dhaka city was originally made in 1959. The administrators of martial law planned to build the current Sangsad Bhavan as a second seat of parliament of Pakistan on the proposed zone as the second capital, Sher-e-Bangla Nagar.
Kahn was originally selected to design the compound of the National Assembly. He was not charged directly, but the project was put to the public to submit preliminary ideas for the complex and in March 1962 he was awarded the project officially.
source: National Assembly of Bangladesh

Norman Fisher House, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
1960

Richards Medical Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
1957-61

Salk Institute, La Jolla, California, USA
1959-66
Salk Institute
photo provided by architect Alan Dunlop
Salk Institute, La Jolla – Salk Institute for Biological Studies Conference

In 1957, Jonas Salk, developer of the first safe and effective polio vaccine, began his quest to “create a collaborative environment where researchers could explore the basic principles of life and contemplate the wider implications of their discoveries for the future of humanity.”
Gifted with 27 acres overlooking the Pacific Ocean by the City of San Diego in 1960, Salk partnered with Kahn to design such a research center. He summarized his aesthetic objectives by telling the architect to “create a facility worthy of a visit by Picasso.”
source: Salk Institute

Trenton Bath House, Trenton, New Jersey, USA
1954-59

Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, Connecticut, USA
1969-74

Yale University Art Center, New Haven, Connecticut
1951-53/54

Louis Kahn Residential Architecture – Oct 2016

Location: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Louis Kahn Architect Practice Information

Louis I. Kahn
1901-74
Yale University Art Gallery was his first major project

Louis Isadore Kahn – Jewish architect born in Saaremaa, Russia (now Estonia).
Louis Kahn was born Itze-Leib Schmuilowsky in Kuressaare. His family emigrated to the USA in 1905. He lived and worked in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Exeter Library : Brief Review of the Exeter Library building

Teaching

Professor of Architecture: Yale University 1947-57
Dean, Professor of Architecture: University of Pennsylvania 1957-

Education

University of Pennsylvania: Masters Degree 1924

Pupils included Robert Venturi and Moshe Safdie

The architect died in Pennsylvania Station in New York:
The architect died at Penn Station in March 17, 1974, when his briefcase was opened it contained sketches of Four Freedoms Park, on Roosevelt Island in New York’s East River.
(source: http://uk.phaidon.com/agenda/design/articles/2015/march/17/what-was-louis-kahn-working-on-the-day-he-died/)

Nathaniel Kahn film released in 2003 called My Architect: A Son’s Journey,

Louis Kahn Memorial Park : Pine Sreet, Philadelphia

Modern Architects

Louis Kahn Architect – article posted Aug 2016

American Architects

Hood Museum of Art Building Renovation, Dartmouth College, Hanover
Date built: 1985
Original Building Design: Charles Moore Architect
New Building Design: Billie Tsien and Tod Williams
Hood Museum of Art Building Renovation design
image courtesy Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects
Hood Museum of Art Building Renovation – Mar 2016
Dartmouth College, Hanover

Louis Kahn : Philadelphia Architect

Louis Kahn protege : Robert Venturi of Venturi Scott Brown

Louis Kahn – Awards

American Institute of Architects Twenty-Five Year Award:
Phillips Exeter Academy Library

AIA Gold Medal : 1971

RIBA Gold Medal : 1972

American Architecture
Paul Rudolph Hall
photo : Peter Aaron

Pennsylvania Architecture

A former pupil is Moshe Safdie who leads an international architecture office from Boston, MA, USA.

Modern Architects

Architecture Studios

Comments / photos for the Louis Kahn Architecture – 20th Century American Architects Practice: page welcome