Gropius in Chicago Coalition - Individual Works

The Legacy

Individual Works

This page presents a chronological listing of the individual works at Michael Reese Hospital that our research has demonstrated to have had significant design involvement by Walter Gropius. We also suggest viewing our Interactive Campus Architecture Map, which has information on all of the 30+ buildings at the Michael Reese Hospital campus, including those below.

The Gropius works are in addition to the substantial site planning, strategic, and organizational efforts he brought to the campus development. Gropius’s guiding hand was supported by talent from local architects, and frequently by his associates in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Michael Reese’s in-house planning staff, many of them graduates of Gropius’s program at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design (GSD), also contributed materially to the outcome of the structures.

The following list is the most definitive compilation of Gropius’s works at Michael Reese Hospital to-date. However it should not be held as the ultimate listing. Indeed, research already suggests that there may be other buildings at Michael Reese Hospital that eventually will be included here. On-going research by The Gropius in Chicago Coalition’s founder, Grahm Balkany, continues to explore these possibilities.

We encourage you to investigate each work, with its own unique features and intrigue. Most of the information is structured via guided tours that can be accessed by selecting a building from the brief descriptions below. (Editor’s Note: The photo tours are currently under construction, and should be visible soon. Thank you for your patience.)

		The Laundry Building
		Design Development: Construction: Consulting Architect: Local Architect:	1946-1948 1948-1949 Walter Gropius Michael Reese Hospital Planning Staff John T. Black Reginald Isaacs
		The first building executed with Walter Gropius at Michael Reese Hospital features a sophisticated design that belies its supporting role as the hospital’s primary laundry. Symmetrical in nature, the building features buff brick in Flemish bond, exposed concrete, and a delicately proportioned steel and glass curtain wall with modulated rhythms.

		The Singer Pavilion (also known as the Psychiatric-Psychosomatic Hospital)
		Design Development: Construction: Consulting Architect: Local Architect: Coordination:	1946-1948 1948-1950 Walter Gropius Loebl, Schlossman, and Bennett Michael Reese Hospital Planning Staff
		The Singer Pavilion is the result of years of planning effort on behalf of the design team and hospital staff. As the first actual patient building to be erected during the campus expansion, it set the tone for much of the campus development to come. Gropius was particularly interested in the environmental siting of the building and climatic response, as well as in a residential and humane character for the building. The structure featured numerous advances for its day, and won an AIA award in 1951.

		The Power Plant (also known as Michael Reese Service League Power Plant)
		Design Development: Construction: Consulting Architect Local Architect: Coordination:	1950-1952 1952-1953 The Architects Collaborative (TAC) Walter Gropius Norman Fletcher John C. Harkness Robert McMillan Friedman, Alschuler, and Sincere Michael Reese Hospital Planning Staff
		The visually striking Power Plant is a powerful and well-loved landmark on Chicago’s South Lakefront. Constructed in an area that was exclusively industrial at the time, the plant now seems a curious but pleasant anomaly. The local architects were the same as those who worked with Mies van der Rohe on the highly successful Illinois Institute of Technology power plant, reflecting Gropius and the Planning Staff’s lasting admiration for Mies’s work and the strong desire that the two major area campuses be complementary.

		The Private Pavilion (also known as the Kaplan Pavilion)
		Design Development: Construction: Consulting Architect: Local Architect: Coordination:	1947-1953 1953-1955 The Architects Collaborative (TAC) Walter Gropius Norman Fletcher Jean Fletcher Loebl, Schlossman, and Bennett Richard M. Bennett Michael Reese Hospital Planning Staff
		Conceived as the new primary hospital building at Michael Reese Hospital, the Private Pavilion is a highlight of Gropius’s early American period, successfully merging his earlier Bauhaus architectural principles with climate-driven design and a unique aesthetic appropriate to its Lake Michigan setting. The building’s mostly glass southern facade features projecting sunshades similar to the earlier Singer pavilion, but is organized in bands of wonderfully articulated steel windows that recall earlier Bauhaus precedents. Noted Chicago architect Richard M. Bennett contributed to the design of the structure, as well as many others at Michael Reese Hospital.

		The Serum Center (also known as the Michael Reese Research Foundation)
		Design Development: Construction: Consulting Architect: Local Architect: Coordination:	1948-1953 1953-1956 The Architects Collaborative (TAC) Walter Gropius Norman Fletcher Jean Fletcher A. Epstein and Sons Ray Epstein A. Epstein Michael Reese Hospital Planning Staff
		Well known to many Chicagoans as one of the most visible structures on the Reese campus, the Serum Center building’s fine pedigree has almost never been discussed. Sharing many traits in common with Gropius’s famous Graduate Student Center at Harvard University (1950), the Serum Center offers a fascinating point of investigation into this rare and unusual transitional period of Gropius’s early American career. After many years of planning, the building was finally completed in early 1956.

		The Convalescent Home (also known as the Friend Pavilion)
		Design Development: Construction: Consulting Architect: Local Architect: Coordination:	1953-1954 1954-1957 The Architects Collaborative (TAC) Walter Gropius Norman Fletcher Jean Fletcher Loebl, Schlossman, and Bennett Michael Reese Hospital Planning Staff
		Reflective of the TAC concept that a building’s complexity should mirror its purpose, the Convalescent home is a direct and handsome essay in simplicity and tranquility. A small outbuilding in the south area of the campus, the structure is designed with utmost care and attention to detail. A playful landscape of rolling hills supplements the Home’s expansive windows and natural ventilation, all conceived for the purposes of peaceful healing.

		The Cummings Pavilion (also known as the Cummings Research Laboratory)
		Design Development: Construction: Consulting Architect: Local Architect: Coordination:	1956-1957 1957-1958 The Architects Collaborative (TAC) Walter Gropius Norman Fletcher Jean Fletcher Loebl, Schlossman, and Bennett Michael Reese Hospital Planning Staff
		Gropius’s last known design to be rendered in primarily steel and glass, the Cummings Pavilion continues a campus vocabulary developed for the Serum Center and first executed at the Linear Accelerator. The enameled steel facade, with tubular steel mullions and clear lites in steel sash, is impressive in its delicacy. The building’s rear volume is executed in the familiar Reese campus buff brick.

		The Linear Accelerator (also known as the Radiation Oncology Wing)
		Design Development: Construction: Consulting Architect: Local Architect: Coordination:	1951-1953, 1958-1959 1953, 1960, 1967 The Architects Collaborative (TAC) Walter Gropius Norman Fletcher Jean Fletcher Loebl, Schlossman, and Bennett Michael Reese Hospital Planning Staff
		The linear accelerator building, which had a second-story addition in 1960 and small horizontal expansion in 1967, is an unusual structure built for an unusual purpose. The building, which housed the first linear accelerator in any US hospital, features an articulated steel and glass second story, set atop a brick and concrete base. Of particular note is the unusual steel construction vocabulary, and trademark TAC color scheme.

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