Harrison, Wallace Kirkman

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Harrison, Wallace Kirkman (1895–1981). American architect, he formed one of the most successful practices in the USA. With Raymond Hood and others he worked on the Rockefeller Center, NYC (1929–33), and was joined by Abramovitz in 1941. As Harrison, André Fouilhoux, and Abramovitz, the firm expanded the Rockefeller Center, work continuing until 1974. After Fouilhoux's death (1945), the firm became Harrison & Abramovitz and, with Le Corbusier, Niemeyer, and Markelius, designed the United Nations Headquarters, NYC (1947–53), with the Secretariat, one of the city's first curtain-walled skyscrapers. Then came the Corning Glass Center and Administrative Building, Corning, NY (1955–6), followed by the Phoenix Mutual Life Insurance Building, Hartford, CT (1960–4). A much more formal style was adopted for the Lincoln Center, (NYC 1959–66), with its Metropolitan Opera House and Philharmonic (now Avery Fisher) Hall: the building is clad in travertine, and the style is an extremely stripped minimalist type that cannot really be called Neo-Classical. The gigantic South Mall, Albany, NY (1963–78), was supposedly influenced by the Dalai Lama's Palace at Lhasa, Tibet.

Bibliography

Koolhaas (1978);
Krinsky (1978);
Newhouse (1989);
Stem et al. (1995);
E. Young (1980)

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Wallace Kirkman Harrison

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