An edition of Designing MIT (2004)

Designing MIT

Bosworth's New Tech

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Last edited by MARC Bot
May 11, 2025 | History
An edition of Designing MIT (2004)

Designing MIT

Bosworth's New Tech

"Chartered in 1861, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology lay in financial crisis with an assortment of laboratories classrooms, offices, and student facilities scattered across Boston's Back Bay by the turn of the century. But in 1912, backed by some of the country's leading financiers and industrialists, MIT officials purchased an undeveloped tract of land in Cambridge, launching a long and complex review of proposals for a new quadrangle. Largely on the basis of the recommendation of John D. Rockefeller Jr., the commission was awarded to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts-trained architect William Welles Bosworth, known for his AT & T Building in Manhattan and Kykuit, the Rockefeller mansion in Tarrytown, New York."

"Designing MIT is the first book to detail Bosworth's challenges in the planning and construction of the Institute's unique Cambridge campus. Beginning with an examination of the competing project proposals - from Steven Child, an emerging landscape designer and student of Frederick Law Olmsted; Desire Despradelle, chairman of the Department of Architecture at MIT and a leading Beaux-Arts stylist; Ralph Adams Cram, noted for his gothic West Point campus; and John Freeman, one of the country's leading civil engineers - Mark M. Jarzombek provides a cross-section of the architectural debates of the time.

Though Bosworth's considerable social and political finesse enabled him to land the commission and balance varied competing interests, he found his classically oriented vision challenged by the engineer John Freeman, a proponent of Frederick W. Taylor's new principle of Scientific Management. However strained, the conflict ultimately resulted in a far more innovative design than either individual approach, one that employed new European concepts in industrialism, efficiency, and aesthetics in academic structures."

"Heavily illustrated with images from the MIT archives, the story of Bosworth's new "Tech" offers more than just insight into the designing of a campus. Fraught with artistic clashes, bureaucratic tangles, and contemporary politics, Designing MIT sheds light on the academic culture in the early twentieth century, the role of patronage in the world of architecture, and the history of the Beaux-Arts style in the United States."--Jacket.

Publish Date
Language
English
Pages
192

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Edition Availability
Cover of: Designing MIT
Designing MIT: Bosworth's New Tech
2017, SA+P Press
in English
Cover of: Designing MIT
Designing MIT: Bosworth's New Tech
October 28, 2004, Northeastern University Press
Library binding in English

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Book Details


Classifications

Library of Congress
T171.M475 2004, T171 .M475 2004

The Physical Object

Format
Library binding
Number of pages
192
Dimensions
10.1 x 8.2 x 0.9 inches
Weight
1.6 pounds

Edition Identifiers

Open Library
OL8574081M
ISBN 10
1555536190
ISBN 13
9781555536190
LCCN
2004009736
OCLC/WorldCat
55124376
LibraryThing
5990390
Goodreads
4424753

Work Identifiers

Work ID
OL8834048W

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May 11, 2025 Edited by MARC Bot import existing book
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December 30, 2022 Edited by MARC Bot import existing book
April 30, 2008 Created by an anonymous user Imported from amazon.com record