Louis Sullivan's Ann Halsted Row Houses.. ~ Bryn Mawr Historic District [Edgewater Presbyterian Church]

Ann Halsted Row Houses.. [1884-85]
1826-34 N. Lincoln Park West..
Architects: Adler & Sullivan
A set of five row houses.
Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan began with the construction of only 3 townhouses in 1885. Later, two more townhouses were added. Louis Sullivan was still young and relatively unknown in Chicago in 1884-85, when he built residences for Ann Halsted, a wealthy woman, who rented them for families and then sold them.

Thanks to the GRACIOUS hosts, Hjordis and Jim Garner..
I saw a Louis Sullivan townhouse inside-out.. Their house is wonderfully preserved and they showed me books and newspaper clippings where their beautiful Sullivan house have been written about.. Here's a excerpt from a Chicago Tribune article by Abigail Foerstner [Sunday, Sep 7, 1986]..
The architect is a legend to most Chicagoans, but to the people who live in the townhouses, the legend touches their lives every day in the stained glass skylight and signature details.

"In the morning when the sun shines through it, the stained glass window throws color all over the living room. Towards evening, the colors become very serene", says Chicago attorney Lawrence Kipperman who restored his townhouse..

Notice how the stairways follows a gracefully curving wall..

" There was a decorative aspect to all his work, but it wasn't decoration. Ornament was a part of the architecture, an original American architecture.."
- Tim Samuelson..

Sullivan's floral patterns is present in embryonic form at the townhouses.Sullivan, one of the founders of modern architecture in America, gave form to the skyscrapers. Though his skyscrapers are dwarfed by their contemporary counterparts, they remain testament to Sullivan's creativity. Steel frame construction made the new designs possible and Sullivan approached them with light, airy designs suggested by new skeletal form. Still in his hands the facade rose in festive busts of berries, leaves and flowers, molded in terra cotta over the steel. Sullivan had spliced the Victorian and modern ages...

The original Sullivan door-knob ornamentation..

This Sullivan's well preserved townhouse, is mentioned in many books..
- Louis Henry Sullivan - by Mario Manieri Elia
- Sullivan's City: The Meaning of Ornament for Louis Sullivan - By David Van Zanten
- The autobiography of an idea - Louis H. Sulllivan..