Albert Kahn
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- See Albert Kahn (banker) for the French banker or Albert E. Kahn for the writer
Albert Kahn (March 21, 1869 — December 8, 1942) was the foremost American industrial architect of his day. He is sometimes called, the architect of Detoit. Kahn came to Detroit in 1880 at the age of 11 from Germany. As a teenager he got a job at the architectural firm of Mason and Rice. Kahn won a year's scholarship to study abroad in Europe, where he toured with another young architecture student, Henry Bacon, who would later design the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.
The architectural firm Albert Kahn Associates was founded in 1895. He developed a new style of construction where reinforced concrete replaced wood in factory walls, roofs, and supports. This gave better fire protection and allowed large volumes of unobstructed interior. Packard Motor Car Company's factory built in 1907 was the first development of this principle.
The success of the Packard plant interested Henry Ford in Kahn's designs. Kahn designed Ford Motor Company's Highland Park plant, begun in 1909 where Ford consolidated production of the Ford Model T and perfected the assembly line. Kahn later designed, in 1917, the massive half-mile-long Ford River Rouge Plant. The Rouge grew into the largest manufacturing complex in the U.S., with a force that peaked at 120,000 workers. According to the company website, "By 1938, Kahn's firm was responsible for 20 percent of all architect-designed factories in the U.S."
Kahn was responsible for many of the buildings and houses in Walkerville, Ontario built under direction of Walker family including Willistead Manor. Kahn's interest in historically styled buildings is also seen in his houses in Indian Village, Detroit, Cranbrook House, the Edsel Ford House and the Dearborn Inn, the world's first airport hotel.
Kahn's firm's Moscow office built 521 factories between 1930 and 1932.
Kahn also designed the landmark 28-story Art Deco Fisher Building in Detroit, considered one of the most beautiful elements of the Detroit skyline. In 1928, the Fisher building was honored by the Architectural League of New York as the year's most beautiful commercial structure.
A frequent collaborator with Kahn was architectural sculptor Corrado Parducci. In all Parducci worked on about 50 Kahn commissions including banks, office buildings, newspaper buildings, mausoleums, hospitals and private residences.
Kahn's firm designed a large number of the army airfield and naval bases for the United States government during World War I. By World War II, Kahn's 600-person office was involved in making Detroit the Arsenal of Democracy including designing the Detroit Arsenal Tank Plant, and the Willow Run Bomber Plant in Ypsilanti, Michigan where Ford Motor Company mass produced B-24 Liberator bombers, Kahn's last building. Albert Kahn worked on more than 1,000 commissions from Henry Ford and hundreds for other automakers.
As of 2006 Kahn had around 60 buildings listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Not all of Kahn's works have been preserved. The Donovan Building, later occupied by Motown Records, abandoned for decades, was demolished as part of Detroit's beautification plan before the Super Bowl in 2006.
He is not related to American architect Louis Kahn.
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[edit] Kahn-designed buildings
- Dexter M. Ferry summer residence in Unadilla Center, New York; early 19th century stone farmhouse remodeled in 1890. Extant today. Known as Milfer Farm, held by Ferry heirs today. Kahn also designed the "Honeymoon Cottage" on the estate, one of the earliest prefabricated houses built.
- Hiram Walker offices, 1892, in Windsor, Ontario
- Detroit Racquet Club, 1902
- Temple Beth El, 1903, Kahn's home synagogue, now the Bonstelle Theatre of Wayne State University
- The Palms Apartments, 1901-3, on Jefferson Avenue, Detroit
- Belle Isle Aquarium and Conservatory, 1904, and Casino, 1907 on Belle Isle, Detroit
- George N. Pierce Plant, 1906, in Buffalo, New York
- Willistead Manor, 1906, home of the son of Hiram Walker
- Battle Creek Post Office, 1907, concrete construction method used again later that year in Kahn's Packard plant
- Packard Plant, 1907, Kahn's tenth factory for Packard but first concrete one
- Cranbrook House, 1907, at Cranbrook Educational Community
- Highland Park Ford Plant, 1908, Highland Park, Michigan
- Mahoning National Bank, 1909, Youngstown, Ohio
- Detroit News building, 1917
- General Motors Building, 1919, largest office building in the world at that time, GM world headquarters, now State of Michigan offices
- First National Building, Detroit, 1922
- Detroit Police Headquarters, 1923
- Temple Beth El, 1923, second building
- Walker Power Plant, 1923, in Windsor
- Detroit Free Press building, 1925
- Edsel and Eleanor Ford House, 1927, Henry Ford's son's home, built as an English manor house in Grosse Pointe Shores, Michigan.
- Fisher Building, major skyscraper of Detroit for decades
- River Rouge Glass Plant, 1930
- Dearborn Inn, 1931, world's first airport hotel, built and decorated in the Georgian style
- Ford Rotunda, designed for Chicago World's Fair, 1934 (burned, 1963)
- Dodge Truck Plant, 1938, Warren, Michigan
- Detroit Arsenal Tank Plant, 1941, produced 1/4 of American WWII tanks, continued tank production until 1997
- Willow Run Bomber Plant, 1941, used by Ford for bombers during the war, then by Kaiser for cars, then by GM for transmissions
- Ford Assembly Building, California
- Buildings at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor: Engineering Building (now called West Hall, with George Mason) 1904, Hill Auditorium 1913, Natural Science Building 1913, Hatcher Graduate Library 1920, Clements Library 1923, Angell Hall 1924, Couzens Hall 1925, University Hospital (now destroyed) 1925, Simpson Institute for Medical Research 1927, Burton Tower 1936
Motor Wheel Factory in Lansing Michigan (1918). Currently being renovated into residential lofts.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- Lewis, David L. "Ford and Kahn" Michigan History 1980 64(5): 17-28. Ford commissioned architect Albert Kahn to design factories
- Matuz, Roger (2001). Albert Kahn, Builder of Detroit. Wayne State University Press. ISBN 0814329578.
- Sobocinski, Melanie Grunow (2005). Detroit and Rome: building on the past. Regents of the University of Michigan. ISBN 0933691092.
