Carl Street Studios - Purchasing The Mansion and Renovation

Purchasing The Mansion and Renovation

In 1927, Kogen purchased the mansion at 155 West Carl Street, which stood on two city lots, and asked Miller to help convert the structure into an aesthetically enticing, modern studio complex for emerging artists. From the outset, the central idea behind Carl Street Studios was to create a series of unique art studio apartments that would open out to closed communal exterior spaces fraught with gardens, fountains, koi fish ponds and, of course, art. A somewhat similar concept had already been established at the Tree Studios, located further south on State Street, earlier in the 20th century. However, unlike the Tree Studios complex, Kogen and Miller conceived of a studio complex whose interior and exterior spaces would themselves be innovative works of art, and not merely functional spaces for the production of art.

To help build the complex, Kogen and Miller recruited some of their former colleagues from the Art Institute and other like-minded emerging Chicago artists, including John W. Norton, Edgar Britton, Edward Millman, Stewart Rae and a highly talented and versatile Mexican immigrant, Jesus Torres. In exchange for their respective contributions, these artists would be permitted to reside free-of-charge in the studios as work progressed.

Work began in 1927, when the crew of artists gutted the three-story mansion, including the basement. Edgar Miller is credited with creating the interior space plan for all of the studio units in the former mansion, which included using basement spaces as primary living areas, a novel concept at the time, and featuring duplex architectural configurations, which provided for lofted bedroom and art studio spaces above. While functional, kitchens and bathrooms were not a priority. The exterior walls of the mansion were masked with a new face of common brick and featured artistic textural elements and designs.

Miller and his fellow artists met the challenge of maximizing light in each studio while maintaining privacy. In some units, soaring windows of stained, painted and/or obscure glass, painstakingly rendered by Miller, were installed. The building also pioneered the extensive use of block and molded, textured glass for primary living space windows. Interior walls (composed mainly of plaster), fireplaces and floors were aesthetically enhanced with painted murals, plaster reliefs, and hand-carved patterned wood elements. One of the most distinctive features of the apartments is the extensive and highly innovative use of a myriad of colored marbles, terrazzo, and Rookwood, Teco, Grueby and Batchelder tiles on all manner of surfaces. Decorative copper, iron and steel work abound, and creative lighting (for the time) added allure and intrigue to the studios. The exterior door of each unit enjoys its own distinctive personality (many with intricate hand carved elements by Edgar Miller and Jesus Torres), and contributes to the asymmetrical flavor of the building.

Much of the high-grade materials used in the building were reclaimed by the artists from demolished mansions in the area, demolished buildings from the 1933-34 Century of Progress International Exposition (in which many of the artists contributed), and, later during the depression, the Maxwell Street market vendors. After work on the studios in the mansion was completed, the artists erected additional four-story buildings lining the periphery of the property that essentially created the enveloped east courtyard that you see today. Artistic flourishes, such as interesting brick and tile work, mosaics, plaster and ceramic reliefs and wood carvings, mainly by Edgar Miller and Jesus Torres, enhanced the aesthetic impression of these newer structures, which contained additional artist studios with equally fanciful and dramatic interior spaces. Committed to the artistic gestalt of the complex, Miller and his crew of artists at an early date replaced the sidewalk in front of the building with a dramatic walkway of colorful and diverse tiles and marbles which informs the visitor or casual passerby that Carl Street Studios is a unique phenomenon to Chicago, and also gives a glimpse of what mysteries lie behind the front wall of the complex.