S. R. Crown Hall is a building on the campus of the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Completed in 1956, the structure was designed by the architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe for the IIT's College of Architecture, which he led for two decades. Crown Hall is a Chicago Landmark and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a National Historic Landmark.
The building occupies a rectangular site of , with its longer axis running east–west, and consists of two levels: the main story and a basement. The main level is raised and is accessed mainly from a porch to the south. The glass curtain wall is divided horizontally into three tiers of panes, interspersed with steel columns and mullions. The roof is above the main level and is supported by four girders, which rest on four pairs of columns. Inside, the main level is a mostly open plan space with half-height partitions; there are no interior columns besides two mechanical shafts. The basement consists of rooms arranged around a U-shaped corridor that links two stairways.
The site was previously occupied by Mecca Flats, which was demolished in 1952. Mies was first commissioned to design a lecture hall for IIT's architecture school in 1950. The building was named in honor of the businessman S. R. Crown, whose brothers Henry and Irving donated $250,000 for construction. Work began on December 2, 1954, and the building was dedicated on April 30, 1956. The windows were replaced in the 1970s, and an air-cooling system was added in the late 20th century. Extensive renovations in the 2000s fixed issues with the design, upgraded mechanical systems, and made the building more energy efficient. Over the years, the structure has received praise for its design, and numerous commentators described it as a major accomplishment by Mies. The building has also received architectural awards and has been depicted on a postage stamp.
Site S. R. Crown Hall is located at 3360 South State Street, on the campus of Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), in the South Side of Chicago in Illinois, United States. Crown Hall occupies a rectangular site of , with its longer axis running east–west. Alfred Caldwell, who frequently worked with the building's architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, was responsible for the landscape around Crown Hall. The landscape features originally included honey locust trees surrounding the building on three sides; these trees helped cool down the windows but have since been felled. The main entrance faces south toward where 34th Street would have run. Directly west of the building is a north–south pathway and a tree-lined lawn. To the north of the building is a larger lawn that runs along the eastern side of the neighboring Siegel Hall. The Chicago "L"'s 35th–Bronzeville–IIT station is located just east of Crown Hall.
Architecture Ever since its completion in 1956, Crown Hall has been occupied by IIT's College of Architecture program. The structure was designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who directed the program from 1938 to 1958 and designed approximately 20 buildings on the campus. Pace Associates was the associate architect, while Frank J. Kornacker & Associates was the structural engineer. Although Crown Hall includes several design features that were commonplace in other contexts (such as plate girders, rolled steel, and welded joints), many of these features had seldom been used as they were in Crown Hall's design.
Exterior Except for the areas around the entrances, the exterior is made entirely of steel and glass. About of steel was used throughout the building. Most of the steel is welded together, though some of the design elements are made of rolled steel. The exterior was originally covered with lead paint in a charcoal hue described as "Mies black"; gradual deterioration caused the paint to become gray by the 2000s. When the building was renovated in 2005, a three-layered paint was applied to the facade due to restrictions on lead-based paint in the United States. The curtain wall is composed of single-layered glass and is divided horizontally into three tiers and vertically into multiple bays.
Entrances Crown Hall's main entrance is through the south porch, a terrace with a travertine marble floor, on the southern elevation of the facade. The south porch is placed within a steel frame, cantilevered outward from the wall. Because the porch floats above the ground, trash tends to accumulate underneath. The porch functions as an intermediate landing for two short flights of steps, which descend to the ground and ascend to the main entrance. Both flights have handrails on either side. The stairs are designed to appear as though they are floating, since there are no risers vertically separating each step. They are stylistically similar to the stairs outside Mies's Farnsworth House in Plano, Illinois. The entrance itself consists of a pair of stainless-steel doors; there is no canopy above the main entrance door, likely because it would have created a visual distraction. Architectural Forum and The New York Times described the entrance as being reminiscent of classical architecture, albeit without the elaborate design details associated with that style.
There is a rear entrance in the middle of the northern elevation, which also consists of a pair of stainless-steel doors. Flights of concrete stairs lead up from the west and east to a concrete landing, where two travertine steps lead to the rear entrance. Underneath the concrete steps are additional stairs, which lead to two sets of hollow-steel double doors in the building's basement. There are metal handrails around and along the steps.
Curtain wall Of the three tiers of window panes, the upper and middle tiers correspond to the upper level, and the lower tier corresponds to the basement. The upper tier of windows (known as the upper lights) measures approximately tall, while the middle tier measures tall. Vertical mullions, consisting of steel I-beams, divide each tier into bays measuring wide. The eastern and western elevations have 11 bays, and the northern and southern elevations have 22 bays.
The original upper lights were transparent to allow students to work in sunlight. The original panes were only thick, and they tended to bow inward or break during windy weather. The 1975 replacement project added new upper lights thick. The 2005 replacement involved installing panes, measuring thick, to meet modern building codes. Since conventional glass tends to become greener at higher thicknesses, the upper lights are made of low-iron glass, which does not turn green as it becomes thicker. Due to modern building-code requirements and space limitations, the tops of each pane are held in place by sloped window stops, which measure thick at the top and thick at the bottom. Although the stops are barely visible, they were controversial when installed, as Mies's original design did not include any diagonals or slopes. The stops are held in place by small steel fasteners.
The middle and lower tiers were originally translucent to provide some privacy and reduce distractions. Within both tiers, each bay has two panes separated by an additional mullion. In the middle tier, there are louvers or ventilation flaps at the bottom of each pane, allowing the main level to be naturally ventilated; these flaps had to be operated manually. The six center bays on this tier, next to the entrances, lack louvers and were originally transparent. The windows for the basement, the lower lights, were held in place by window stops at their tops. They doubled as clerestory windows for the basement, and they could be opened for natural ventilation. Over the years, fingerprints and common materials such as tape caused scratches and stains, so the original panes were replaced with laminated glass in 1975. During the 2005 renovation, most of the middle- and lower-tier windows were replaced again with panes, while transparent tempered glass was added next to the entrances. The inward-facing portions of the lower lights are sandblasted to give them a translucent effect, as this was more resilient than the original laminated glass.
Columns and roof
Unlike most other contemporary buildings, Crown Hall's entire superstructure was on its exterior and was completely visible from the outside. Crown Hall was Mies's first such design and is an early example of a clear span structure. The building is supported by H-shaped columns on the facade, which are welded to flanges along the roof and floor slab. The northern and southern elevations each have four columns; each column to the north is paired with another to the south. The columns on each elevation are spaced apart, and the roof is cantilevered outward from the westernmost and easternmost pairs of columns. The columns thus divide the building from west to east into a 1-3-3-3-1 configuration. The three 60-foot sections and the two 20-foot sections add up to a total building length of .
Four steel plate girders, which run north–south between each pair of columns, carry the entire weight of the roof and are visible from the exterior of the building. Each girder measures long (spanning the building's entire width) and deep, while the roof itself is above the main level. By suspending the roof from the girders, Mies eliminated the need for interior columns and created an open plan space. The roof itself is made of gravel and asphalt, with interior drains and an aluminum (originally copper) coping at its perimeter. In the center of the roof is a penthouse for mechanical functions. The penthouse measures across, with louvers on its western and eastern elevations, as well as translucent panels on the other elevations. There is also a photovoltaic power station on the roof, as well as a battery energy storage system that can store up to of energy.
Interior The interior spans around . It is split between the main level and a basement. Each floor has a gross floor area of approximately and is arranged on a grid of squares measuring on each side. Like many of Mies's other works, which had a floating quality because they were placed slightly above ground, the main level of the building was placed above ground to create a raised basement. City building codes at the time of Crown Hall's construction required that multi-story buildings have concrete fireproofing, but since Crown Hall has one above-ground story, the metal was allowed to be left exposed.
When Crown Hall was built, the windows provided natural ventilation, and a hot-air system heated the building. The hot-air system consists of diffusers in the ceiling and a radiant heating system embedded into the main level's concrete floor. However, an air-conditioning system was not installed until later (despite being part of the original plan). Instead, Venetian blinds ventilated the upper level.
Main level
The main level occupies the building's entire site of and is arranged on a north–south axis, flanked by eastern and western wings. Arranged in a roughly symmetrical layout, it was the largest interior space that Mies designed in his lifetime. Its open plan, suitable for a myriad of uses, made it the first "universal space" that Mies designed in his career. The open plan may have been in part inspired by Museum for a Small City, a 1942 design for a building with a single large room that could be adapted to multiple uses. Mies used details from the Museum for a Small City design not only at Crown Hall, but also in his earlier Farnsworth House and his later Neue Nationalgalerie.