Barry Byrne
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Barry Byrne (19 December 1883 – 18 December 1967) was initially a member of the group of architects known as the Prairie School. After the demise of the Prairie School about 1914-16, Byrne continued as a successful architect by developing his own personal style.
Francis Barry Byrne was born and raised in Chicago. After seeing a Chicago Architectural Club exhibit in 1902, he sought employment with Frank Lloyd Wright and secured a position although untrained in architecture. As Wright’s son, John, relates:
“William Drummond, Francis Barry Byrne, Walter Burley Griffin, Albert McArthur (Albert Chase McArthur), Marion Mahony, Isabel Roberts and George Willis were the draftsmen. Five men, two women. They wore flowing ties, and smocks suitable to the realm. The men wore their hair like Papa, all except Albert, he didn’t have enough hair. They worshiped Papa! Papa liked them! I know that each one of them was then making valuable contributions to the pioneering of the modern American architecture for which my father gets the full glory, headaches and recognition today![1]
After working for Wright for several years, Byrne worked briefly at other Chicago firms, then moved to Seattle in winter 1908-9 to join Andrew Willatzen, who had been a fellow employee at Wright's office. They formed the firm Willatzen & Byrne and, over the next several years, produced a series of residential designs in the Prairie Style.
After the Willatzen & Byrne partnership dissolved in 1913, Willatzen remained in Seattle but Byrne moved first to California and then returned to to Chicago to take over the practice of Walter Burley Griffin (who moved to Australia).
By 1917 Byrne was practicing under his own name. He briefly served in World War I, then returned to Chicago. In this period, Byrne's style developed independently of Wright and the Prairie School as he moved toward greater simplification of form. During the 1920s some of Byrne's work was suggestive of Expressionism; he became successful as a designer of ecclesiastical and educational buildings.
In the 1930s Byrne moved to New York, but after 1945 returned to Chicago. Byrne partially retired about 1953, but continued to accept commissions until his death. He died in December 1967 after being struck by an automobile. He is buried in Calvary Cemetery, Evanston, Illinois.
[edit] References
- ^ My Father: Frank Lloyd Wright by John Lloyd Wright; 1992; page 35.
- Brooks, H. Allen, The Prairie School: Frank Lloyd Wright and his Midwest Contemporaries, University of Toronto Press, Toronto 1972; ISBN 0802052517
- Hildebrand, Grant, and Giessel Jess M., "Andrew Willatsen," in Shaping Seattle Architecture: A Historical Guide to the Architects (ed. Jeffrey Karl Ochsner), University of Washington Press, Seattle and London 1994, pages 168-173, 312; ISBN 029597365X
[edit] External links
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