Reconstructing the Garrick
Adler & Sullivan’s Lost Masterpiece
John Vinci, Editor
Reconstructing the Garrick is a compelling tribute to one of Chicago’s finest lost buildings. It documents the enormous salvaging job undertaken to preserve the building’s design, presenting the full life story of the Garrick while featuring historic and architectural photographs, essays by prominent architectural and art historians, interviews, drawings, ephemera from its lively history, and details of its remarkable ornamentation.
For six months in 1961, Richard Nickel, John Vinci, and David Norris salvaged the interior and exterior ornamentation of the Garrick Theater, Adler & Sullivan’s magnificent architectural masterpiece in Chicago’s theater district. The building was replaced by a parking garage, and its demolition ignited the historic preservation movement in Chicago.
The Garrick (originally the Schiller Building) was built in 1892 and featured elaborate embellishments, especially in its theater and exterior, including the ornamentation and colorful decorative stenciling that would become hallmarks of Louis Sullivan’s career. Reconstructing the Garrick documents the enormous salvaging job undertaken to preserve elements of the building’s design, but also presents the full life story of the Garrick, featuring historic and architectural photographs, essays by prominent architectural and art historians, interviews, drawings, ephemera from throughout its lively history and details of its remarkable ornamentation—a significant resource and compelling tribute to one of Chicago’s finest lost buildings. A seventy-two-page facsimile of Richard Nickel’s salvage workbook is tipped into the binding.
$45.00 cloth/jacket ISBN 978-1-5179-1280-2
352 pages, 250 color plates, 8 x 13, 2021
John Vinci, FAIA, senior partner and practicing architect, Vinci/Hamp Architects, Inc., has been an architect in Chicago for more than sixty years. He taught the history of architecture at the Illinois Institute of Technology and has extensive experience in exhibition curation and design. In 1961 he worked with Richard Nickel to salvage the Garrick Building’s ornament for the City of Chicago.
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Archidose blog review of RECONSTRUCTING THE GARRICK and LOUIS SULLIVAN'S IDEA.