Philip Johnson was born in 1906 in Cleveland, Ohio. Johnson, one of the most important names in architecture, before designing his first building at the age of 36, worked as a customer, critic, writer, historian, museum director in different professions.
In 1949, Johnson was the first director of the Architecture Department of the Museum of Modern Art. Then, he designed a residence for his master’s thesis and the successful architecture adventure began. The famous architect died in 2005 at the age of 99.
Puerta de Europa
These two office towers flank the Paseo de la Castellana, Madrid’s most important boulevard. The location of a subway interchange made the placement of the two towers near the street impossible.
Their bold design is in part a response to the need for the footprints of the towers to be set back from the interchange while at the same time bringing the towers together as a single compositional whole.
The towers lean towards each other and over the plazas, ensuring their visibility from up and down the Paseo and creating a portal which, being at the Northern end of the business district of Madrid, has been called a metaphorical gateway to Europe.
The Lipstick Building
The Lipstick Building is a 453 foot (138 meters) tall skyscraper located at 885 Third Avenue, in Manhattan, New York City, United States. It was completed in 1986 and has 34 floors. The building was designed by John Burgee Architects with Philip Johnson.
The building receives its name from its shape and color, which resemble a tube of lipstick. At three levels, blocks of the building recede as part of Manhattan’s zoning regulation in which the building is required to recede within its spatial envelope, to increase the availability of light to street level.
The result is a form that looks as though it could retract telescopically. The shape, which is unusual in comparison to surrounding buildings, uses less space at the base than a regular skyscraper of quadrilateral footprint would use. This provides more room for the high numbers of pedestrians who travel via Third Avenue.
PPG Place
PPG Place sits atop three-city-block site in the heart of downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, adjacent to historic Market Square. The shimmering glass complex is centered on a 40-story office tower, reflecting the skies, hills, rivers, and buildings of one of America’s most liveable cities.
PPG Place offers premier office space, dining facilities, and service accommodations. In addition to the centrepiece 635-foot (194 m) tower, there are five other buildings in the complex – a 14-story building and four six-story buildings. The buildings surround a grand plaza evoking visions of the great public squares of Europe.
Paved in a mosaic of red, grey and black granite, the plaza serves both as a restful haven and a reflection of a pulsing urban marketplace.
The gleaming glass and steel structures, known worldwide for their breath- taking design, were developed by John Burgee Architects with the internationally renowned architect Philip Johnson from New York.
This complex was designed to weave into the architecture of Pittsburgh and recall the city’s great buildings, such as the Cathedral of Learning and the Allegheny County Courthouse. PPG Place’s neo- Gothic forms are the perfect architectural bridge between the historical structures of the city and the newer geometrical high-rise towers.
References
• Philip Johnson: Life and Work By Franz Schulze. University of Chicago Press, Jun 15, 1996.
• Philip Johnson: The Constancy of Change. Emmanuel Petit. Yale University Press, 2009.
• Philip Johnson and the Museum of Modern Art. Philip Johnson, Kirk Varnedoe. The Museum of Modern Art, 1998.
