Constructing Chicago

Title: Constructing Chicago
Author: Daniel BlueStone
ISBN: 9780300048483
Publisher: Yale University Press
Published: 1991
Binding: Hardcover
Language: English
Number of Pages: 248
Publisher Description: Chicago's impressive industrial expansion in the late 19th-century convinced most observers that the city was defined by the crass pursuit of wealth and that its architecture was, as described by Lewis Mumford, a brutal network of industrial necessities. In this book, Daniel Bluestone disputes this vision of the city. Combining architectural history and cultural analysis, Bluestone explores the creation of Chicago's parks, churches, skyscrapers, and civic buildings. He finds that the structure of the city was influenced as much by the moral, cultural, and aesthetic aspirations of its local elite as by the untempered forces of commerce and capital.