Rapp and Rapp

Edit links
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

C. W. & George L. Rapp
Practice information
Key architectsC. Ward Rapp; George L. Rapp; Mason G. Rapp
PartnersC. Ward Rapp; George L. Rapp
Founded1906
Dissolved1965
Location
Chicago, Illinois
Balaban & Katz
and completed in 1921.
The Uptown Theatre in Chicago, completed in 1925.
Shea's Performing Arts Center, originally Shea's Buffalo, completed in 1926.
Paramount Building in Times Square, New York City
, completed in 1927.
Old Dearborn Bank Building in Chicago
, completed in 1928.
The Paramount Theatre in Denver, completed in 1930.

C. W. & George L. Rapp, commonly known as Rapp & Rapp, was an American

Bismarck Hotel and Theatre (1926) and Oriental Theater (1926) in Chicago, the Five Flags Center (1910) in Dubuque, Iowa and the Paramount Theatres in New York City (1926) and Aurora, Illinois
(1931).

Warner Grand Theater (Milwaukee) Wisconsin built in 1931

The named partners were brothers C. Ward Rapp (1860–1926) and George L. Rapp (1878–1941), sons of a builder and natives of

William M. Rapp (1863–1920) or the notable Cincinnati architects George W. Rapp and Walter L. Rapp
, to whom they were not related.

Biographies and history

Cornelius Ward Rapp was born December 26, 1860. In the 1880s he moved to Chicago, where he worked for architect Cyrus P. Thomas. In 1889, the two formed the partnership of Thomas & Rapp.[1] This was dissolved in 1895, when both opened independent offices. Rapp's major projects over the next eleven years included Altgeld Hall (1895–96) and Wheeler Hall (1903–04) at what is now Southern Illinois University Carbondale and the Coles County Courthouse (1898–99) in Charleston.[2] His father was superintendent of construction for both Carbondale buildings.[3] Rapp was an independent practitioner until 1906, when he formed a partnership with his younger brother, George L. Rapp.[4]

George Leslie Rapp was born February 16, 1878. He was educated in the

William M. Rapp. After George L. Rapp's retirement in 1938, Mason G. Rapp succeeded to the practice. After the death of his uncle in 1941 he renamed the firm Rapp & Rapp, which had always been its common name. In 1965 Rapp retired, and the firm was dissolved.[4] Mason G. Rapp died in 1978.[5]

Legacy

The Rapp brothers were among a group of highly influential American theatre architects, which also included

movie palaces, including a number of atmospheric theatres, which utilized romantic architectural elements to evoke specific times and places. Their only surviving atmospheric theatre in Chicago is the Gateway Theatre, now the Copernicus Center, completed in 1930. If murals were to be included in the theatres, Louis Grell
of Chicago was commissioned to paint them.

Many of the theatres and other buildings designed by the Rapp brothers have been listed on the United States National Register of Historic Places.

Buildings

Some of the notable buildings that the firm designed include:

Chicago, Illinois

Other areas

Denver, Colorado
  • Paramount Theatre
Aurora, Illinois
Champaign, Illinois
  • Orpheum Theater
Galesburg, Illinois
Joliet, Illinois
Streator, Illinois
  • The Majestic Theatre
Davenport, Iowa
Dubuque, Iowa
Sioux City, Iowa
  • Orpheum Theatre
Wichita, Kansas
  • Miller Theater (1922-1972)
Ashland, Kentucky
Detroit, Michigan
Kansas City, Missouri
St. Louis, Missouri
Jersey City, New Jersey
  • Loew's Jersey Theater
Buffalo, New York
Middletown, New York
New York City
  • Paramount Theatre
    , Brooklyn
  • Paramount Theatre
    , Times Square
  • Kings Theatre, Brooklyn (formerly Loew's Kings Theater)
Cincinnati, Ohio
Cleveland, Ohio
  • Palace Theatre
Youngstown, Ohio
Tulsa, Oklahoma
  • Akdar Theatre 1922-1964
Portland, Oregon
Erie, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
  • Loew's Penn Theatre
    (now Heinz Hall)
West Chester, Pennsylvania
Providence, Rhode Island
Mitchell, South Dakota
Chattanooga, Tennessee
Memphis, Tennessee
Charlottesville, Virginia
  • Paramount Theater
Seattle, Washington
  • Paramount Theatre
Baraboo, Wisconsin
  • Al. Ringling Theater
Madison, Wisconsin
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Kenosha, Wisconsin
  • Gateway Theatre, now the Rhode Center for the Arts
Racine, Wisconsin
  • RKO Main Street Theatre

References

  1. ^ "Personal" in Building 10, no. 4 (January 26, 1889): 32.
  2. ^ Coles County Courthouse NRHP Registration Form (1978)
  3. ^ Daniel B. Parkinson, A Historical Bulletin of the Southern Illinois State Normal University (Carbondale, 1914)
  4. ^ a b c d Richard W. Longstreth and Steven Levin, "Rapp and Rapp" in Macmillan Encyclopedia of Architects 3, ed. Adolf K. Placzek (New York: Free Press, 1982): 532.
  5. ^ "Deaths" in AIA Journal 67, no. 9 (August, 1978): 77.
  6. ^ At La Salle Street / Randolph Street / Wells Street. The German architect Albert Eitel worked together with Rapp and Rapp at the facade design and was responsible for the interior design of the hotel. House builders were Emil, Karl and Otto K. Eitel stemming from Germany. See: New Bismarck-Hotel in Chicago. Moderne deutsche Einrichtungskunst in Amerika. In: Innendekoration 38.1927, Seite 254-272.
  7. ^ Virgin Hotel Phorio

Further reading

  • Charles Ward Rapp, Rapp & Rapp, Architects (2014)

External links

Media related to Rapp & Rapp at Wikimedia Commons

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rapp_and_Rapp&oldid=1220074384"