Architects and engineers whose buildings, bridges and structural systems reshaped the American landscape.
Pei came to the United States to study architecture and built a seven-decade career that included the National Gallery of Art East Building, the Louvre Pyramid and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He became one of the most internationally recognized architects working from America.
“Architecture is the art of how to waste space.”
Mies came to the United States in the late 1930s and led architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology. His glass-and-steel buildings and minimalist design language became central to postwar American modernism and the corporate skyscraper.
“Less is more.”
Founder of the Bauhaus, Gropius left Germany under Nazi rule and joined Harvard’s architecture faculty. His teaching and design ideas strongly influenced American modern architecture, planning and design education through generations of students and colleagues.
“Only together can we achieve what we cannot do alone.”
Saarinen came to America as a teenager and became one of the leading architects of the postwar era. His Gateway Arch, TWA Flight Center and other projects brought sculptural form and expressive engineering into major American public architecture.
“Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context.”
Already a leading Finnish architect, Saarinen settled in the United States in the 1920s and became closely associated with the Cranbrook educational community in Michigan. His teaching helped shape a generation of American architects and designers, including his son Eero.
“Always design a thing by considering it in its next larger context — a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an environment.”
Schindler came to the United States in 1914, worked with Frank Lloyd Wright and settled in Los Angeles. His experimental houses used open plans, concrete and indoor-outdoor space in ways that anticipated the informal California modern style.
“Space is the medium of architecture.”
Neutra moved to Los Angeles and became one of the most internationally recognized architects of California modernism. Houses such as the Lovell Health House and Kaufmann Desert House used glass, landscape and precise modernist detailing to redefine American residential design.
“The house must be built so that people can live in it happily, healthily, and comfortably.”
Khan came to the United States on a Fulbright scholarship and joined Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. His tubular structural systems made extremely tall buildings more efficient and practical, influencing skyscraper engineering worldwide and enabling projects such as the Sears Tower.
“The technical man must not be lost in his own technology.”
Roebling came to Pennsylvania in the 1830s and became a pioneer of wire-cable suspension bridges. His engineering work culminated in the design of the Brooklyn Bridge, completed after his death under the direction of his son Washington Roebling.
“The superior man is he who develops, in harmonious proportions, his moral, intellectual, and physical nature.”
Ammann came to New York in 1904 and became one of the defining bridge engineers of the 20th century. His designs included the George Washington, Bayonne and Verrazzano-Narrows bridges, giving him an extraordinary physical imprint on the New York region.
“The great bridges of New York are monuments to the courage and engineering genius of those who built them.”