American Architecture Students in Belle Epoque Paris: Scholastic Strategies and Achievements at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts

Abstract

The Gilded Age and Progressive Era witnessed the largest influx of American architecture students to the Paris Ecole des Beaux-Arts. The U.S. contingent—120 students admitted in the 1890s, 154 in the 1900s—accounted for 10 to nearly 20 percent of incoming students each year. This illustrated essay uses projects prepared by these students to introduce the major features and principles of the Ecole's architecture curriculum, in particular the physical and instructional framework of the atelier and the medium of the concours. The essay presents a step-by-step selection of projects by American students admitted between 1890 and 1909. These range from a twelve-hour sketch problem required for the admission competition to a diplôme (masters' thesis). Beyond introducing the Beaux-Arts method of instruction, these prints provide insight into the subsequent American career of their authors and thus of American architecture and urban design overall, given the enormous influence exerted by the Ecole des Beaux Arts and its anciens élèves. Drawings requested from Ecole students were not just artfully composed and brilliantly rendered pictures. They were problem-solving endeavors. Former students preserved them not only as study models, but also as status symbols, even trophies.