Architecture of Noise
UIC School of Architecture 2025-26 Douglas A. Garofalo Fellowship
Speculative Mass
The Chicago School’s great architectural invention united space, structure and speculation. First an extension of the lake’s shore, then the emergence of the Chicago frame and typical plan, the free flowing space of Frank Lloyd Wright and finally Universal Space, Mies van der Rohe’s crystal synthesis. That apex is represented by the Edith Farnsworth House and S.R. Crown Hall. From there the progression appeared to go dark. But Chicago quietly turned to a new phase without steel and glass, a noisy mass of speculative potential. Sites where speculation alone ossified into a silent architectural form, hardened by its potential futures. Stalled by economic and political potential these sites make objects where there none, an extension of the speculative free plan. Is this be the next phase of architects or its end? The basis of the Chicago School is isolated in five case studies.