The skyscraper
The steel frame frees a building from its own walls
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A skyscraper is a building in which an internal frame carries the weight, so that the outer walls need only keep out the weather. The skyscraper required three things at once: cheap steel, the safety elevator, and a building code that allowed it. Chicago had all three after the fire of 1871, which had emptied the centre and made rebuilding an open problem. The form was then exported worldwide, and is among the few building types with a demonstrably American origin. The steel came from Pittsburgh, from ore out of Minnesota.
For children
Before 1885, tall buildings needed walls so thick at the base that there was hardly room left inside. In Chicago a steel skeleton was built instead to carry the weight, so the walls only had to keep the weather out. Then buildings could go as high as one liked.
Sources
- Condit, The Chicago School of Architecture (1964)
- Art Institute of Chicago: Chicago-skolen
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