The Roaring Twenties and a New America

Whenever someone lists The Great Gatsby as their one and only favorite book on Facebook you know they haven't read a book since middle school. It's no wonder. Between The Thorn Birds and Jane Eyre, it's the most entertaining book most of us have ever been forced to read.

I've been obsessed with The Gilded Age and the Roaring Twenties since I was a kid. My grandparents' home is a living gallery of portraits and photographs of another time and place, an era when the children of the Industrial Revolution danced and drank with unfettered regard, erecting shrines to their own narcissism, and ushering in a new era of art and architecture that remains to be rivaled.

A temporary experiment in excess, the Roaring Twenties had a threshold. No capitalistic walkabout can continue without end, a reality we are once again faced with today. Any man can fly without wings, but the higher you fly, the farther you fall. Our American culture will never experience the decadence of the Roaring Twenties because we will forever know that it culminates in a Great Depression.

That knowledge will never change our fascination with the blind ambition of an era responsible for the Philadelphia Museum of Art, jazz, modern architecture, and fostered an enlightened culture that questioned the convention of their ancestors, fueling the fire of a blazing trail towards true freedom for all Americans.

The Roaring Twenties were nothing if not reckless, but that carefree abandonment of our antiquated social structure questioned more than Prohibition. The children of the era trotted the globe in search of stimulation, experimenting with everything from religion to sexuality, bringing home not just art but cultural ideals and a renewed sense of tolerance.

Blaming the era's carelessness on the Great Depression is too easy and two dimensional. Very few cultures can survive on static values, and a capitalistic democracy needs to evolve to thrive. The fire started when America was founded, and these eras of extreme wealth fan the flames of great change.

Politics muck up the importance of these eras. Conservatives laud the laissez faire capitalistic approach that creates these wealthy bubbles, while liberals criticize these brief periods of excess that ironically fuel many of their own causes.

Without a bunch of bored rich kids burning through their trust funds, would our nation's decision makers be asking "why not?" on topics like marriage equality and universal healthcare? Probably not, at least not so soon. 

Like the flappers of the Roaring Twenties, our own hipsters and scenesters are quickly deconstructing the social structure of our ancestors, one which was firmly established after the Great Depression. And in a clear case of history repeating itself we spent the better part of our early 21st Century making a mess of things, and in the aftermath, like the 1950's and 1960's, are streamlining the mess, mainstreaming our new ideals, and creating a freer more accessible America.

And with that, Baz Luhrmann's, The Great Gatsby...

The economics of architecture and the anthropology of American style

Like art, the politics of an era play a strong roll in the elements of architectural style. America’s most iconic state buildings are inspired by the world’s classic Democratic civilizations. Our dedicated monuments honor our historic leaders in temples that saint them as gods.

As much as politics, the economy of an era has influenced our built world. Our Colonial beginnings are remembered in the quaint streets of Washington Square where small homes conservatively housed our Founding Fathers. Even Independence Hall and other 18th Century civic structures, while grand in theme, were subdued in pomp.

A hundred years later, the global Gilded Age driven by America’s Industrial Revolution reinvented architecture’s message. The wealth of the client was garishly displayed in the various styles of the Victorian era. Rich colors and textures were found in exotic woods. Expensive silks and leathers adorned the walls of even the more modest of homes, some of which can still be found in the West Philadelphia twins along Spruce Street.

The artchitectural detailing on Victorian homes along Spruce Street in West Philadelphia is representative of the economy of the era.

While the elements of Victorian era styles are anything but subdued, exaggerated elements can be found in the works of Frank Furness. A caricature of these styles, and perhaps one of the inspirations for the more refined Art Nuevo movement can be seen in Antonio Gaudi’s late 19th Century designs.

Frank Furness's Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts

When any culture becomes excessively decadent, a rebellious counter culture is bound to surface. The idealistic youth of the early 20th Century rejected the saturated styles of the Victorian era with a number of artistic movements, namely with the soft, organic lines and lights pastels of Art Nuevo. To the modern eye the styles may not be very distinguishable, but artistically, Art Nuevo and various Victorian styles are symbolic opposites.

Perhaps the most dramatic comment on the excess of the Gilded Age would be International Style. Although not initially successful in the United States, it saw enormous popularity in countries eager to distinguish themselves from American capitalism.

One of the largest, early examples of International Style can be found in Philadelphia. In a twist of irony, the Pennsylvania Savings Fund Society employed a style intended to criticize capitalism to make the ultimate capitalistic statement. By stripping the skyscraper of any stylistic elements, the bank snubbed others who displayed their wealth and success with ornately adorned phalluses.

Philadelphia's PSFS Building is the world's first example of a skyscraper designed in International Style, a style that would prevail as the dominant skyscraper design for the rest of the century.

The Great Depression immediately followed the completion of the PSFS Building. It’s difficult to say if its style would have succeeded otherwise, but the failing economy motivated clients to reject the lush lines of a culture that led to the country’s demise. Likewise, the art community embraced this simplicity for political reasons.

A year later the Empire State Building opened. Its Art Deco style dominated America’s civic structures for decades and came to symbolize our rebirth. Art Deco train stations and post offices can be found across the country, many throughout Philadelphia. Ironically, along with International Style, Art Deco was dominantly employed to represent Communist and Socialist movements across Europe.

An Art Deco relief on Philadelphia's 9th and Market Post Office.

Although the elements in Art Deco were far simpler and cheaper than the preceding Victorian styles, it became clear that as buildings were to grow taller, the new economy would not afford the classic elements of style.

The success of the PSFS Building gave developers a unique opportunity. For the first time, an artistic movement was branded specifically for economic purposes. Art and architecture became commodities, not finely crafted luxuries. And the audience ate it up.

Philadelphia's early 20th Century skyline, thanks largely to the opulence of America's Gilded Age and the Industrial Revolution, was comprised of ornately adorned stone towers. The Great Depression forced developers to seek cheaper ways to build taller. The PSFS Building at the top center was the world's first skyscraper designed in International Style and would serve as the prototype for a century of affordable skyscraper construction.

Art critics tailored the process of interpretation to excuse limited design. Glass curtains were praised for their lack of presence, but those in the design community said nothing of the absent statement made by these unadorned walls. Like modern art, less meant more and we were stunned by the boldness of nothing. And in order for industrial cities to continue to rise, developers needed this trend to continue.

But a century later we continue to interpret meaningless art on behalf of our artists. International Style was invented to oppose capitalism, but its composite construction of cheap materials allowed it to become the ultimate capitalistic blindfold.

People continue to demand less and are willing to pay more for it. While skyscrapers were diluted in order to afford their height, the same practice has been applied to low level and residential architecture in the name of profit. Once architecture meant something in even the most humble of homes, but today’s wealthiest clients have become more concerned with prefabricated amenities than the aesthetic details of their environment.

Throughout the majority of the last century, very few styles have made a statement that wasn’t purely philosophical. A stagnant art scene can be measured anthropologically, and it’s no coincidence that the world’s most exciting experimental architecture can be found in emerging countries like India and China, and in the Middle East.

As the United States struggles to identify as the world’s Super Power, other countries are beginning to experience their own Victorian Gilded Age, which is evident in the skylines of Shanghai and Mumbai and the palaces of the United Arab Emirates.

Neither Snow nor Rain nor Heat nor Gloom of Night

Given it's struggling presence amidst private delivery operations and an exponentially expanding system of electronic communication, it's hard to believe that less than a century ago the postal empire was a driving force of the American way of life. The 1930s re-branded this empire with new designs in everything from advertisements to architecture.

Post Office 9th and Chestnut

With the Great Depression bringing the private sector to its knees, cash was being pumped into social services. Around the country post offices, court houses, police stations, and railroad houses were being torn down and rebuilt. Art Deco, although discreetly less expensive than the garish Victorian styles that preceded it, became the symbol of a country reborn.

Sculpture Depicting Postman

Philadelphia replaced its main post office at 9th and Market with a post office and court house built in this new style. A new main post office in the same style was erected at 30th and Market where the new 30th Street Train Station would replace the Broad Street Station which sat across from City Hall.

Sculpture Depicting Postman

While many past styles have not weathered the test of time, Art Deco has remained relatively timeless since its inception. Victorian and Gothic styles, even City Hall, spent decades as eyesores in the eyes of the public, while these Art Deco public spaces have remained delightfully appreciated. While we look in disdain at Modernist incarnations from the 50s and 60s, and the cold Brutalism that ruled the 80s, we've continued to appreciate the soft lines of what this movement has left us.

Post Office 9th and Market

Even during an economic disaster worse than anyone today can ever imagine, architecture remained to be more than the set-construction we employ today. Even our generation's commercial spaces are rarely more than warehouses dressed up in plastic facades.

Sadly one might argue that this was the last architectural era that offered its audience an element of style where design didn't take a backseat to budget.