Golden Door Archives - Chicago's 1893 Worlds Fair

Angels in the Spandrels: The Winged Decorations of Louis Sullivan’s Transportation Building
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Angels in the Spandrels: The Winged Decorations of Louis Sullivan’s Transportation Building

HISTORY, RESEARCH

Angels in the Spandrels: The Winged Decorations of Louis Sullivan’s Transportation Building

Critics glorified and reviled Louis Sullivan’s renegade design for the Transportation Building at the 1893 World’s Fair. The polychromatic color scheme and the grand Golden Door received the most commentary at the time of the Columbian Exposition, and both elements continue to fascinate students of architecture today. Louis Sullivan’s striking design for the Transportation Building featured a polychromatic façade and majestic “Golden Door” entrance on the east side. [Image from Picturesque World’s Fair. W.B. Conkey, 1894; digitally edited [...]

By Scott|2024-09-06T10:41:43-05:00April 14th, 2024|Categories: HISTORY, RESEARCH|Tags: Golden Door, Louis Sullivan, Transportation Building|1 Comment

The Fair as a Spectacle, Part 2: In Search of the Picturesque
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The Fair as a Spectacle, Part 2: In Search of the Picturesque

REPRINTS

The Fair as a Spectacle, Part 2: In Search of the Picturesque

Continued from Part 1 [Note: This text includes names and descriptions now considered culturally disparaging. Please see our statement on “Potentially Offensive Text and Images.”] THE FAIR AS A SPECTACLE. How it seemed to a visitor—Strolling and dreaming by day and by night. By Charles Mulford Robinson Part 2: In Search of the Picturesque But in that brief view a lesson was also taught you which you took to heart at once. It was that the charm of the [...]

By Scott|2023-07-02T13:10:12-05:00July 1st, 2023|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: Charles Mulford Robinson, Christopher Columbus (statue by Lawrence), Columbian Guard, Court of Honor, Golden Door, gondolas, Ho-o-den, Japanese Tea House, MacMonnies Fountain, Palace of Fine Arts, rolling chairs, Transportation Building, Woman's Building, Wooded Island|1 Comment

The Making of the White City (Part 2)
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The Making of the White City (Part 2)

REPRINTS

The Making of the White City (Part 2)

[Continued from Part 1] A great stage decked with ambitious scenery Perhaps the first thing that would strike a stranger entering the World’s Fair grounds in the summer of 1892 would be the silence of the place, the next the almost theatrical unreality of the impression by the sight of an assemblage of buildings so startlingly out of the common in size and form. When I speak of the silence, I mean the effect of silence. There are seven [...]

119. Picturesque World’s Fair – The Transportation Building
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119. Picturesque World’s Fair – The Transportation Building

REPRINTS

119. Picturesque World’s Fair – The Transportation Building

THE TRANSPORTATION BUILDING.—The Transportation Building was unique among the great structures of the Columbian Exposition in that it was the single departure from a general rule, the contrast and the foil to all the others. It was distinct in its style of architecture, and alone was decorated exteriorly in colors. It was not of those buildings which won for the Exposition the title of "The White City." The main building, located just west of the south end of the [...]

By Randy|2021-06-08T09:23:03-05:00May 30th, 2021|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: Dankmar Adler, Golden Door, Louis Sullivan, PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR, Transportation Building|0 Comments

“Halcyon Days in the Dream City’’ Part 16: The Transportation Building
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“Halcyon Days in the Dream City’’ Part 16: The Transportation Building

REPRINTS

“Halcyon Days in the Dream City’’ Part 16: The Transportation Building

Halcyon Days in the Dream City by Mrs. D. C. Taylor Continued from Part 15 Let us go through the “Golden Gate,” not the gate of the Holy City, but a gate the architect of which must have been dreaming of wondrous Bible imagery, when he designed it.[1] Arch beyond arch, receding, diminishing as they recede, till the last one is about the dimensions of some grand cathedral door, while the noble proportions of the first, are almost awe [...]

By Scott|2021-04-02T11:18:24-05:00November 29th, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: Empire State Express, Golden Door, Transportation Building|2 Comments

93. Picturesque World’s Fair – Southwest from the Government Building
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93. Picturesque World’s Fair – Southwest from the Government Building

REPRINTS

93. Picturesque World’s Fair – Southwest from the Government Building

SOUTHWEST, FROM THE GOVERNMENT BUILDING—The view southwest from the roof of the United States Government Building embraced a great number of attractive objects. The east lagoon and more than half the Wooded Island appeared conspicuously in the foreground, and there was no elevated place in the grounds from which the island and lagoon could be seen together that did not command a sight worth seeing, for any lover of the beautiful. To the left, immediately m front, is the [...]

By Randy|2020-01-26T06:35:44-06:00January 26th, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: Choral Hall, Electricity Building, Golden Door, lagoon, Manufactures and Liberal Arts Building, PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR, Transportation Building, U.S. Government Building|0 Comments

THE CITY OF WONDERS: A Souvenir of the World’s Fair (Chapter 4)
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THE CITY OF WONDERS: A Souvenir of the World’s Fair (Chapter 4)

REPRINTS

THE CITY OF WONDERS: A Souvenir of the World’s Fair (Chapter 4)

THE CITY OF WONDERS A SOUVENIR OF THE WORLD'S FAIR by Mary Catherine Crowley (1894)

By Scott|2024-01-25T18:40:20-06:00December 25th, 2019|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: Empire State Express, Golden Door, John Bull (train), Transportation Building|1 Comment

90. Picturesque World’s Fair – Details of the Golden Doorway
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90. Picturesque World’s Fair – Details of the Golden Doorway

REPRINTS

90. Picturesque World’s Fair – Details of the Golden Doorway

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS Page 90 - DETAILS OF THE ” GOLDEN DOORWAY." DETAILS OF THE ” GOLDEN DOORWAY."—The magnificent entrance to the Transportation Building, known popularly as the " Golden Doorway "—though it was not golden, but green and silver—was not, architecturally considered, complete with the quintuple arches and doorway proper alone, but included, as part of the entrance effects, a system of elaborate lateral ornamentation, the details of which, on one side, [...]

By Randy|2019-11-16T14:26:03-06:00November 16th, 2019|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: Golden Door, Louis Sullivan, PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR, Transportation Building|0 Comments

Louis Sullivan’s Transportation Building … in Green
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Louis Sullivan’s Transportation Building … in Green

NEWS, THEATER

Louis Sullivan’s Transportation Building … in Green

Adler & Sullivan’s Transportation Building. [Image from The World’s Columbian Exposition Portfolio of Views by C. D. Arnold and H. D. Higinbotham (C. B. Woodward Co., 1893).] Finding references to the 1893 World’s Fair--especially in unexpected places--can be a delight. All the more so when images of the White City show up in the context of another personal passion. A few weeks ago, the yellow brick road led to the White City. The Paramount Theater in Aurora, Illinois, [...]

By Scott|2019-01-20T19:07:41-06:00January 20th, 2019|Categories: NEWS, THEATER|Tags: Golden Door, Louis Sullivan, Transportation Building, Wizard of Oz|0 Comments

“World’s Fairs and the Death of Optimism”
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“World’s Fairs and the Death of Optimism”

NEWS

“World’s Fairs and the Death of Optimism”

Darran Anderson’s essay “World’s Fairs and the Death of Optimism” (citylab.com, October 3, 2018) addresses the fading luster of World’s Fairs and uses some examples from the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago to illustrate his point. “World’s Fairs fell from grace,” writes Anderson. “Who could blame nostalgia towards witnessing the Crystal Palace, the head of the Statue of Liberty in a Parisian park, the extra-terrestrial Trylon and Perisphere, or the Tower of the Sun? This was bolstered by [...]

By Scott|2018-10-19T16:14:35-05:00October 20th, 2018|Categories: NEWS|Tags: Dankmar Adler, Ferris Wheel, Golden Door, Lorado Taft, Louis Sullivan, Sophia Hayden, Transportation Building, White Rabbits, Woman's Building|1 Comment