Illinois Insitute of Technology - Mies - De Stijl The Evolution and Dissolution of Neo-Plasticism

Emilia Kightley-Sutter

After Armour Institute and Lewis Institute merged in 1940, Mies van der Rohe was commissioned to create the new master plan for the future Illinois Institute of Technology campus in Chicago. This master plan was a very large job for Mies, so large he developed the plan for 20 years. This plot of land holds 20 of Mies’ work, making it the biggest concentration of his work in the world. One of these works featured on the campus is the famous Crown Hall which is home to the Illinois Institute of Technology’s college of architecture.

Mies’ master plan was formally based on a 24’ by 24’ grid by which he used to determine where building columns would be located, in other words the grid was the structural module. After figuring out the dimensions and square footage of the spaces needed for the campus such as room sizes, drafting rooms, laboratories, and classrooms, the grid length and width was set. This master plan was approached in an unusual way, furniture such as desks, chairs, etc. determined the room size, then from the room size Mies figured out the building size, and then the building size and orientation to the campus. Mies formed a concept of universal space between multistory buildings where people can collaborate and get together outdoors. He expressed structure and used outside surfaces as a skin. A big issue Mies faced was fitting in irregular program and circulation to fit with code and to fit within the grids boundaries. A space that faced him with this hardship is the auditorium. He displaced the auditorium and circulation elements and swapped them into the plan many times until he reached a solution, he reworked the auditorium with the universal space concept and remad the auditorium into a massive, column free area, allowing it to be disoriented from the grid lock.

But Mies didn’t just create his own grid and go off to design, the original street armature gave way to how the grid developed. Green zones and tree plantings were based around where the existing street grid and the new campus came together. Foot paths within the built nature allowed students to be connected with nature during their studies.

Buildings were constructed with steel framing and load bearing floor elements, with reinforced concrete facades. Not only was all of this economical at $10 a square foot, the reinforced concrete was used as a fire precaution.

Mies desired to keep the buildings in modern fashion, he didn’t want to add extra ornament to eventually go out of fashion. He confined his works to modern, “futuristic” looking materials such as glass and steel. This style stands out in the S. R. Crown Hall mentioned earlier. It was designed in 1956, has an open plan, rid of columns once again and creates open universal space where the only partitions of the building are free-standing oak partitions that indicate where different activities in the program are to be held. The open aired studio allows for students ideas and design paths to cross and to share knowledge within the universal space.