Connecticut Architecture. Christopher Wigren
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Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation
Whatever clients’ attitudes toward Modernism and tradition, new technologies and materials strongly influenced planning and construction. Although most new houses were built of traditional brick and clapboards and featured pedimented front doors and small-paned windows flanked by shutters, their split-level forms, open plans, and picture windows all reflected trends introduced by Modernists. And even the most conservative buyers insisted on up-to-date mechanical systems.
FIGURE 55. Steven Izenour of Venturi, Rauch & Scott Brown, George Izenour House, Stony Creek, 1980. Tom Bernard, Courtesy of Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates Inc.
Resistance to Modernism also fed the rise of historic preservation. Like the Colonial Revival, preservation had roots in the late nineteenth-century rediscovery of American history and architecture. Early preservationists had concentrated on restoring colonial buildings as private homes or museums like the Hyland House in Guilford (place 82). But reaction to the widespread demolition of urban renewal and the unfamiliar forms of Modernism brought preservation to public consciousness, and a broader movement emerged.
In spite of its active Modernists, Connecticut with its long history actively took to preservation. As early as 1955 the state established the Connecticut Historical Commission to promote its historic heritage. Two developments in 1959 indicated the growing influence and changing face of the preservation movement. First, the town of Litchfield established a local historic district, which required that a town historical commission approve any alterations to the exterior of buildings or any new construction within the district (place 84). Passed under special enabling legislation from the General Assembly, Litchfield’s was the first of what now are more than one hundred such districts across the state. The second development was the adoption of an urban renewal plan for New Haven’s Wooster Square neighborhood (figure 56). This was one of the first projects in the nation to take advantage of a change in urban renewal regulations allowing federal funding to be used for renovation in addition to demolition and new construction. The Wooster Square plan also demonstrated the broadening of the preservation movement in its acceptance of Victorian-era buildings.23
FIGURE 56. 87–93 Lyon Street, New Haven. Renovation images from the New Haven Redevelopment Agency, from Mary Hommann, ed., Wooster Square Design, 1965. Courtesy of the New Haven Redevelopment Agency
These two developments epitomized the new face of preservation. It is publicly administered and uses public funds to supplement and encourage private investment. Its targets are entire communities and neighborhoods, places of many types and from many eras. No longer focused primarily on commemorating the past, preservation is seen as a tool for planning and revitalization, and reusing significant buildings such as the abandoned Cheney Yarn Dye House (place 100). To accomplish this, it employs feasibility studies and marketing analyses alongside architectural and historical research. One such study, completed by the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation, led to the conversion of the Peter Robinson Fur-Cutting Factory in Danbury to apartments in 1983 (figure 57). Over the years, specific programs have come and gone, funding has risen and fallen, but preservation itself has increasingly influenced the shape of Connecticut.
FIGURE 57. Peter Robinson Fur-Cutting Factory, Danbury, 1884, 1895; converted to apartments, 1983. Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation
The most recent architectural trend to affect Connecticut is sustainability, which emerged at the turn of the twenty-first century. The need to conserve fuels first became a significant issue during the oil shortages of the early 1970s. In Connecticut, which relied heavily on oil for heating, builders and homeowners eagerly sought to reduce energy consumption. But as shortages eased, the search for efficiency lost its urgency. It reappeared in the 1990s along with growing awareness of the toxic effects of some building materials and concerns about climate change caused by the use of fossil fuels.
FIGURE 58. Thomas Lamb, Capitol Building, Hartford, 1926; converted to the Hollander Foundation Center, 2008–2010, Crosskey Architects. Crosskey Architects, LLC
To many, “sustainability” still primarily means efficiency in the use of energy for lighting, heating, and cooling—the main concerns of the 1970s. New buildings have more insulation, and increasingly are designed to use solar, wind, or geothermal power for at least part of their operation. In its current sense, though, sustainability addresses other considerations as well, as the Yale School of Forestry has demonstrated in building Kroon Hall (place 8). Materials are evaluated for the environmental effects of extracting, processing, and transporting them. Planners and developers favor higher densities, to avoid the high costs and disruptions of building new infrastructure systems, and locations easily served by public transportation, to reduce automobile use. Landscape designers incorporate hardy native plants to reduce the need for irrigation or mechanized maintenance such as lawn mowing. Preservationists promote recycling existing buildings as a way of conserving the materials and energy used in their initial construction. They also highlight traditional, low-tech ways of keeping buildings comfortable, such as solar orientation for passive warming and natural lighting, while also adding new features like the green roof installed on the Capitol Building in Hartford (figure 58).
These are, briefly put, some of the historical developments and architectural trends that have shaped Connecticut’s evolution over more than four hundred years. Keeping them in mind, let us now look at one hundred places whose stories will flesh out this overview.
NOTES
1. William Hosley, Colt: The Making of an American Legend (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press in association with the Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, 1996).
2. For more on what architecture is see James F. O’Gorman, ABC of Architecture (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998).
3. For more on why architecture is important see Paul Goldberger, Why Architecture Matters (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2009).
4. Michael Bell, The Face of Connecticut: People, Geology, and the Land (Hartford: Connecticut Geological and Natural History Survey, 1985).
5. Robert M. Thorson, Stone by Stone: The Magnificent History of New England’s Stone Walls (New York: Walker Books, 2002).
6. For a short summary of Connecticut history see Bruce Fraser, The Land of Steady Habits: A Brief History of Connecticut (Hartford: Connecticut Historical Commission, 1988). Regional histories with architectural summaries are found in the Connecticut Historical Commission’s six-volume Historic Context series, Historic Preservation in Connecticut: volume 1, Western Coastal Slope, by Janice P. Cunningham (1992); volume 2, Eastern Uplands, by Linda S. Spencer (1993); volume 3, Central Valley, by Janice P. Cunningham (1995); volume 4, Western Uplands, by Geoffrey L. Rossano (1996); volume 5, Eastern Coastal Slope, by John Herzan (1997); and volume 6, Northwest Highlands, by Geoffrey L. Rossano (1997).
7. Lucianne Lavin, Connecticut’s Indigenous Peoples: What Archaeology, History, and Oral Traditions Teach Us about Their Communities and Cultures (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 2013); William Cronon, Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of Early New England (New York: Hill & Wang, 1983).
8. I am grateful to Laurie Pasteryak Lamarre, former executive director of the Institute of American Indian Studies and currently curator of exhibitions for the Fairfield Museum; and to Katherine Grandjean, assistant professor of history specializing in early