Alden B. Dow: Midwestern Modern Review

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(More customer reviews)This is a beautifully done book reviewing the life and work of Alden B. Dow, a prairie school architect based in Midland, Michigan. I grew up in Midland, so I'm very familiar with his excellent work. It is nice to see it all in beautiful pictures.

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Alden Dow was a midwesterner by birth, but he lefta legacynational instature.

Active from the early 1930sthrough the late 1970s, Dow designed some six hundred projects-oftendaringly modern houses and religious buildings, schools and colleges, business and civic structures, andeven a new town in Texas. He changed the face of hishometown of Midland, Michigan, leaving it more than one hundred houses, officesand plants for The Dow Chemical Company, churches, banks,schools, and recreational structures. Nowhere isDow's genius more evident than in his Home and Studio in Midland, a National Historic Landmark. Alden B. Dow: Midwestern Moderntells the story of both this exceptional residence and the architect who spent a half century developing his vision of amore humane way of building.

Beginning with the family-his father founded The Dow Chemical Company-and the townthat encouraged him, the booktraces the life and work of Alden Dow as well as the intensely personalphilosophy that governedeverything he did. Thearchitect rejected the traditional concept of style and instead urged that buildings reflect theirfunction, inspire their users, and encompass the qualities of honesty, humility, and enthusiasm. "There isnever a finething unless it isoriginal," he suggested,emphasizing the need for creativity and quality. Dow's influences were numerous:nature, the organicarchitecture of Frank Lloyd Wright (with whom he studied briefly as part of the Taliesin Fellowship), reasonand practicality, the arts ofJapan, the color wheel, and, always, an unfailing sense of fun andjoy.
185 color, 220 black-and-white illustrations

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