Beman, Solon Spencer

Beman, Solon Spencer (1853–1914). American architect, trained in the Upjohn office, he designed the celebrated model industrial towns of Pullman, IL (1880–95—with Barrett) and Ivorydale, OH (1883–9), and was a contributor to the achievements of the Chicago School. Uninhibited by squeamishness, he used a palette of styles, as in the houses in Florence Square, South Forestville, Chicago, IL. He designed the Grand Central Station, Chicago (1890), a large iron-and-glass train-shed with a Neo-Romanesque clock tower, which was a successful integration of architecture and engineering. His Mines and Mining and Merchant Tailors pavilions at the World's Columbian Exposition, Chicago (1893), were suitably grand, after which his work became more soberly Classical (e.g. the First Church of Christ Scientist, Chicago (1897), in which the Greek Revival was dominant). His Studebaker (now Brunswick Fine Arts) Building, Chicago (1895), employed finely articulated glazing and terracotta Gothicizing detail.

Bibliography

Chicago Architectural Journal, v (1986), 9–31;
Jane Turner (1996)