Architecture Of Kansas City
The architecture of Kansas City, Missouri and the metro area includes major works by many of the world's most distinguished architects and firms, including McKim, Mead and White; Jarvis Hunt; Wight and Wight; Graham, Anderson, Probst and White; Hoit, Price & Barnes; Frank Lloyd Wright; the Office of Mies van der Rohe; Barry Byrne; Edward Larrabee Barnes; Harry Weese; Skidmore, Owings and Merrill; and others.
The city was founded in the 1850s at the confluence of the Missouri and Kaw rivers and grew with the expansion of the railroads, stockyards, and meatpacking industry. Prominent citizens settled in the Quality Hill neighborhood and commissioned fine homes primarily in Italianate Renaissance Revival style, which continued to be the major influence for new structures past the turn-of-the century. George Kessler's urban plan for Kansas City with its expansive park and boulevard system, inspired by the City Beautiful Movement, made a profound and lasting impact on the city.
The core of the downtown area developed in an early 20th century building boom that continued into the Great Depression. The city has several buildings that place it among cities with the ten best examples of art deco architecture in the United States. Municipal Auditorium, the Kansas City Power and Light Building, and Jackson County Courthouse have been called "three of the nation's Art Deco treasures." J.C. Nichols, a prominent developer of commercial and residential real estate developed the Country Club Plaza (by Edward Buehler Delk and Edward Tanner), and was active in the promotion of lasting architectural landmarks such as Liberty Memorial (Harold Van Buren Magonigle), and Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (Wight and Wight).
A second period of building growth occurred from the 1960s through the 1980s. During this time, Kansas City, Missouri gained much of its modern skyline, including One Kansas City Place, which is currently the tallest building in Missouri at 623 feet. Suburban growth spread into Johnson County, Kansas with new homes and mid-rise office buildings.
After a period of significant decline, downtown Kansas City has been revived by several major new works of architectural design. Sprint Center arena (2007), the Power & Light District entertainment development (2007), the Block Building addition to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (2007), H&R Block World Headquarters (2006), 2555 Grand (2003), Charles Evans Whittaker Federal Courthouse (2000), Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art (1994), American Century Towers (1991 & 1994), Bartle Hall Convention Center expansion (1994), and the Stowers Institute for Medical Research (1994) are among the most prominent and recognizable.
Read more about Architecture Of Kansas City: Early Architecture, Art Deco, Terra Cotta and Gothic Styles, Frank Lloyd Wright Buildings, Modern and Post-modern Architecture, Original Kansas City Architecture, New Development
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“Kansas City is lost; I am here!”
—A. Edward Sullivan. Professor Quail (W.C. Fields)
“In short, the building becomes a theatrical demonstration of its functional ideal. In this romanticism, High-Tech architecture is, of course, no different in spirit—if totally different in form—from all the romantic architecture of the past.”
—Dan Cruickshank (b. 1949)
“The two elements the traveler first captures in the big city are extrahuman architecture and furious rhythm. Geometry and anguish. At first glance, the rhythm may be confused with gaiety, but when you look more closely at the mechanism of social life and the painful slavery of both men and machines, you see that it is nothing but a kind of typical, empty anguish that makes even crime and gangs forgivable means of escape.”
—Federico García Lorca (1898–1936)
“Since the Civil War its six states have produced fewer political ideas, as political ideas run in the Republic, than any average county in Kansas or Nebraska.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)
“When men were all asleep the snow came flying,
In large white flakes falling on the city brown,
Stealthily and perpetually settling and loosely lying,
Hushing the latest traffic of the drowsy town;”
—Robert Bridges (1844–1930)