LOUIS KAHN: THE MONUMENTAL MAN

January 2019

Louis Kahn is a glorified symbol of what can be achieved in architecture if you are willing to give up everything else. Kahn was found dead, almost heroically in architecture folklore, in Penn Station at the age of 73, heavily indebt and unidentified for 2 days. He left behind several true masterworks of architecture that will for centuries be sources of architectural pilgrimage.

I found Kahn’s story, as the original lecturer had intended it, spell-bounding. His personal life, as well as his uncompromising architectural feats, rival that of any of the great design luminaries. He quickly became one of my most admired architectural figures before even stepping foot into one of his built works.

During a recent visit to Louis Kahn’s Salk Institute in La Jolla, California I was once again taken aback by the power and inspiring nature of Kahn’s designs. So far on my travels I have had the pleasure of visiting several of his buildings (Yale University Art Gallery, Yale Center for British Art, Exeter Library and Salk Institute), each visit leaves me reeling with inspiration and desires to seek deeper architectural resolutions. For the first time since arriving in the US I have decided to pause on my constant pursuit of new inspirations and explore Kahn’s work more insightfully and reflect on what he was able to achieve.

Kahn is a mercurial figure in architecture, hard to define and more difficult to ignore. Much like the other contemporary greats, like Frank Lloyd Wright or Alvar Aalto, he is worthy of his very own stylistic chapter due to both his influence on others and his own inherent uniqueness.

Born in Estonia in 1901, before immigrating to USA and eventually settling in Philadelphia, where he would remain for the rest of life. During his early career as an architect Kahn struggled to gain momentum. It wasn’t until a study tour around Europe that he found the focus and meaning for which he had long been searching, monumentality, in the form of the strong and meticulously resolved forms of the Parthenon at the Acropolis. 

This epiphany moment lead to a new direction in his career that began to be realised in buildings such as the Trenton Bath Houses project of 1955. This project shows a clear shift away from the machine like inspirations of his early designs and instead towards a refined aesthetic that prioritised the exploration of modernist uses of ancient forms.

Kahn was renowned as a tenacious designer, often at the expense of the financial feasibility of his own firm and projects. He was eccentrically not content with mediocrity or even quality design. He would re-design and re-design semi-crazily in pursuit of perfection. Even projects that were cancelled were not always safe from his desire to complete an idea.

This pursuit of the perfection of space led to a portfolio of work small in line items, but meteoric in the importance of understanding the way humans experience space.

The exteriors of Kahn’s projects are usually quite unassuming. The exterior, rather than being a feature, is a slave to the interior program and overall concept. This rigour can be felt when exploring his projects; there is a true intangibility to what you feel and uncover. Kahn preached the need for architecture to be so much more than walls enclosing rooms.

He would consistently come back to this rhetoric. It is something that you quickly understand once you get a chance to spend an afternoon in the carrels of Exeter Library, or a slow afternoon exploring the artworks of the Yale Center for British Art. Unlike the works of any others I have experienced, he is able create monumentality that at once overwhelms occupants while thoughtfully creating an atmosphere to enhance the personal experience.

He is able to create the awe of a Gothic Cathedral combined along with the feeling of an individually curated Frank Lloyd Wright home. A truly remarkable combination of moods that few designers have been able to achieve since.

Kahn’s uniqueness revolved around his priority of a conceptual logic. Each item added during the design phase had to serve both its own role and fit within the overarching philosophy of the project.

This fundamental focus on his designs creates a dynamic experience where you can simultaneously enjoy the space and the greater building as a whole. Each space feels linked immediately to the next, all working together like an amazing game of Tetris to achieve the sublime.

Kahn’s obsession with his designs extended into the tectonics of architecture. The construction of the building needs to also be a crucial part of the overall concept of the design.

Kahn continued this thoroughness into the siting and layout of his buildings with a true mastery of light and shadow. The material selections were often quite rudimentary, such as concrete or brick, however he managed to use the texture, colour and construction technique of each material in a way that allowed them to reach their highest potentials. He also proudly allowed materials to stand strongly apart from each other, with the contrast in materials often delivering the powerful form that Kahn was seeking to achieve ever since his visit to the Acropolis.

This obsession with all parts of the project is obviously cost-prohibitive for the general public. However it does start an interesting debate on the long-term economy of buildings. In recent times in Australia, there has been a small rebellion against fast-fashion and the linear extension to this mindset would be a counter to the fast-construction being built by developers in swathes across the world. 

Kahn’s designs will stand for centuries to come. There bold, monumental forms are planned to age gracefully and stand as a monument to their functions. The cost equations of this strategy is hard to rationalise upfront to any client outside of a Gallery, Library or University, however I am looking forward to visiting an array of Kahn’s residential projects in Philadelphia in 2019 to develop a greater understanding for how his work transfers to the smaller scale.

Louis Kahn and his array of Monumental projects were a main reason for my move to the US. Each of his projects is possibly worthy of their own book and I couldn’t stress their importance more in the understanding of architectural space and cohesion.

Each buildings deep sense of order and rigouress design consistency has the ability to trigger ones curiousity and then continue to keep inspiring the occupant as the knowledge of the space is slowly imparted upon them. The otherworldliness of Kahn’s masterpieces is something that is rare to experience and is testament to his incessant desire to achieve something special, something truly monumental.

References:

Robert Twombly, ‘Louis Kahn: Essential Texts’, 2003

Yutaka Saito, ‘Louis I. Kahn House: 1940-1974’, 2005

Image Sources:

1. Louis Kahn Looking at His Tetrahedral Ceiling in the Yale University Art Gallery in 1953, Louis I. Kahn Collection, The Architectural Archives, University of Pennsylvania, Photographer: Lionel Freedman

2. Salk Institute, Authors own image

3. Jewish Community Centre, Ewing Township, New Jersey, 1954-59, Louis I. Kahn Collection, The Architectural Archives, University of Pennsylvania, Photographer: John Ebstel

4. Phillips Exeter Academy Library Carrels, Wikipedia

5. Yale Center For British Art, Paul Mellon Center

6. Korman House, Pool House, Photographer: Matt Wargo