The Glessner House, characterized by simple massing and random-height layers of gray granite, is one of H. H. Richardson’s finest works. Completed in Chicago in 1887, the house is the only remaining building designed by Richardson in the city. John J. Glessner was an executive with the International Harvester Company.
Richardon’s inward-looking design meant that the walls of the U-shaped façade were built close to the lot lines, allowing for a spacious, private interior courtyard. Natural light entered the house through south-facing windows on the courtyard. A long servant hall on the north side of the house protected the family spaces from the city’s winter winds and the dirt and noise of the surrounding streets. Exterior ornamentation is minimal, creating a somewhat fortresslike appearance.
Born in Louisiana in 1838, Richardson is perhaps best known as the architect of Trinity Church in Boston. He earned his architecture degree at Harvard and in 1859 left for Paris to study at the Ecole des Beaux Arts for five years. His unique style, radical for the time, became known as Richardsonian Romanesque.
The Glessner House was one of Richardson’s last commissions. He died the year before it was finished, and his firm, Shepley, Rutan and Coolidge, oversaw its completion.
The house was ranked 85th in a 2007 national poll of AIA members and the public to identify their 150 favorite structures.
