James Nagle (architect)
Encyclopedia
James Nagle is an American architect. He received a Bachelor of Arts from Stanford University in 1959, a Bachelor of Architecture from M.I.T. in 1962, and a Master of Architecture from Harvard University in 1964. Following graduation from Harvard, Nagle travelled to the Netherlands as a Fulbright Scholar to study architecture and urbanism. On his return to the United States in 1965, Nagle joined the office of Stanley Tigerman
, leaving in 1966 to open a firm with Larry Booth, a fellow architect at Tigerman's office. In 1981, Nagle left his partnership with Booth to establish Nagle Hartray and Associates with Jack Hartray. The firm is known today as Nagle Hartray Architecture
.
Nagle has taught design at the University of Illinois at Chicago
(UIC) and the Illinois Institute of Technology
(IIT). He has made accreditation visits to Columbia University and Harvard University and has taught, exhibited, and lectured extensively at numerous other schools of architecture. Additionally, he has served as Chairman of the AIA
National Committee on Design, President of the Chicago Architecture Foundation
, President of the Graham Foundation
Board, and Design Juror on many State and National Awards Programs. He is a member of the Archeworks Board of Directors, the Design Matters Advisory Committee, and the Board of Overseers at the IIT College of Architecture.
Nagle’s firm has won over seventy-five industry design awards and has been published in architectural magazines nationally and internationally. Nagle has designed over 100 single-family houses for clients across the country.
The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
(MCA) organized a reunion of the Chicago Seven in 2005 to discuss the contemporary state of Chicago architecture, Celebrating 25 Years of the Chicago Seven. As part of the panel discussion, Nagle commented on the state of affairs that prompted the intervention of the Chicago Seven: "It wasn't Mies that got boring. It was the copiers that got boring.... You got off an airplane in the 1970s, and you didn't know where you were." In his interview as part of the Chicago Architects Oral Histories Project, Nagle spoke of the work his office was doing at that time: "I remember the reaction to [one of our projects] was, Wow, these guys are changing; they're doing things that are different from what they did before; there's a new movement afoot. So we all got excited about moving on to something that was different. A lot of it really had to do with history. That's what the postmodernist movement was all about. The appreciation of history made us all much better architects. One of the things that I find from 1930s and 1940s architecture is that the people who have gone through the Beaux-Arts understand the history of architecture and for the good architects, such as Alvar Aalto and Corbusier, it probably made them better modernists because they didn’t learn through abstraction. Gropius was wrong. You should know your history and understand and be able to operate on those levels and then go on to do your own thing and presumably do something that’s original."
Stanley Tigerman
Stanley Tigerman is an American architect, theorist and designer. He studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the Chicago Institute of Design, and Yale University. After serving several years in the United States Navy, he assumed the role of draftsman and designer in a series of offices...
, leaving in 1966 to open a firm with Larry Booth, a fellow architect at Tigerman's office. In 1981, Nagle left his partnership with Booth to establish Nagle Hartray and Associates with Jack Hartray. The firm is known today as Nagle Hartray Architecture
Nagle Hartray Architecture
Chicago firm Nagle Hartray Architecture was founded in 1966. The firm's early reputation was grounded in single-family and multi-family housing. Recent and current projects reflect diversification of the former focus, emphasizing educational, spiritual, civic, and media communication programs...
.
Nagle has taught design at the University of Illinois at Chicago
University of Illinois at Chicago
The University of Illinois at Chicago, or UIC, is a state-funded public research university located in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Its campus is in the Near West Side community area, near the Chicago Loop...
(UIC) and the Illinois Institute of Technology
Illinois Institute of Technology
Illinois Institute of Technology, commonly called Illinois Tech or IIT, is a private Ph.D.-granting university located in Chicago, Illinois, with programs in engineering, science, psychology, architecture, business, communications, industrial technology, information technology, design, and law...
(IIT). He has made accreditation visits to Columbia University and Harvard University and has taught, exhibited, and lectured extensively at numerous other schools of architecture. Additionally, he has served as Chairman of the AIA
American Institute of Architects
The American Institute of Architects is a professional organization for architects in the United States. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the AIA offers education, government advocacy, community redevelopment, and public outreach to support the architecture profession and improve its public image...
National Committee on Design, President of the Chicago Architecture Foundation
Chicago Architecture Foundation
The Chicago Architecture Foundation is a nonprofit group in Chicago, Illinois, USA, dedicated to increasing the public's understanding of architecture and design...
, President of the Graham Foundation
Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts
The Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, based in Chicago, supports the arts, architecture, and institutions through public programs, and grants for projects....
Board, and Design Juror on many State and National Awards Programs. He is a member of the Archeworks Board of Directors, the Design Matters Advisory Committee, and the Board of Overseers at the IIT College of Architecture.
Nagle’s firm has won over seventy-five industry design awards and has been published in architectural magazines nationally and internationally. Nagle has designed over 100 single-family houses for clients across the country.
The Chicago Seven
Nagle was a member of the first-generation post-modernist group, the "Chicago Seven," along with fellow practicing architects Ingo Freed, Tom Beeby, Larry Booth, Stuart Cohen, Stanley Tigerman, and Ben Weese. The name "Chicago Seven" was selected to reference the group of anti-war radicalists who stood trial in the city in 1970, since the architects' philosophy was similarly iconoclastic. The Chicago Seven architects "through exhibitions, symposia, teaching and building worked to construct viable alternatives to the then still oppressive hegemony of Chicago's modernist legacy. Led by Tigerman, theirs was an ambitious opposition to institutionalized modernism through an inversion of architectural style and the deployment of semantic devices intended for a broader audience. Despite the reliance on form, sometimes ironic and sometimes nostalgic, this was the first broadly conceptualized alternative to Chicago's modernist architectural canon." An example of the Chicago Seven's efforts to catalyze design innovation was their exhibition "Le Cadavre Exquis" ("the exquisite corpse"), which produced variations on the Chicago townhouse to "demonstrate the harmonious variety of a cityscape allowed to develop through minimally controlled 'accident.'"The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
The Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago is a contemporary art museum near Water Tower Place in downtown Chicago in Cook County, Illinois, United States. The museum, which was established in 1967, is one of the world's largest contemporary art venues...
(MCA) organized a reunion of the Chicago Seven in 2005 to discuss the contemporary state of Chicago architecture, Celebrating 25 Years of the Chicago Seven. As part of the panel discussion, Nagle commented on the state of affairs that prompted the intervention of the Chicago Seven: "It wasn't Mies that got boring. It was the copiers that got boring.... You got off an airplane in the 1970s, and you didn't know where you were." In his interview as part of the Chicago Architects Oral Histories Project, Nagle spoke of the work his office was doing at that time: "I remember the reaction to [one of our projects] was, Wow, these guys are changing; they're doing things that are different from what they did before; there's a new movement afoot. So we all got excited about moving on to something that was different. A lot of it really had to do with history. That's what the postmodernist movement was all about. The appreciation of history made us all much better architects. One of the things that I find from 1930s and 1940s architecture is that the people who have gone through the Beaux-Arts understand the history of architecture and for the good architects, such as Alvar Aalto and Corbusier, it probably made them better modernists because they didn’t learn through abstraction. Gropius was wrong. You should know your history and understand and be able to operate on those levels and then go on to do your own thing and presumably do something that’s original."
Selected Past Work
- Sundial House :: Unbuilt
- James Nagle's entry for the 1976 Chicago Seven exhibit of theoretical house designs, presented at the Richard Gray Gallery on Michigan Avenue. Designed for an abstracted dunes site, the house explores neo-plastic space derived from De Stijl, the forms of Le Corbusier, and the tension between the circle and orthogonal grid. Though it was a theoretical project, it was designed to be buildable, with tight control of form and program within the circle. As Nagle wrote at the time, architecture “should create a harmonic whole and it is best when it achieves a maximum plastic expression while solving the practical requirements.”
- Kinzie Park Tower :: Chicago, IL
- "This condominium tower achieves what many River North apartment and condo buildings miss. Instead of having balconies sticking out of the facade, on this building they are tucked neatly between each sculptural curve and angle. Those curves also provide unusually expansive views for a great number of units."
- Greyhound Bus Terminal :: Chicago, IL
- In addition to 35000 square feet (3,251.6 m²) of enclosed space, the terminal has 10000 square feet (929 m²) of space under each of its two bus canopies. The requirement of unobstructed space beneath the canopies’ 45 feet (13.7 m) span informed the structurally expressive profile of "this elegant essay in architectural engineering." Recipient of an Award of Merit from the Structural Engineers Association of Illinois.
- Homan Square Housing :: Chicago, IL
- Construction of low-cost housing within an ambitious master plan contributed to the general revitalization of an area that had been in decline since the 1970s. Recipient of the Design Matters: Best Practices in Affordable Housing Award.
- Architect's Cottage :: Door County, WI
- The pavilion-style cottage is 1500 square feet (139.4 m²) in area, plus porches and carport. Materials include clear cedar siding and ceilings, local field stone chimney and walkways, fir floors, birch doors and white plaster partition walls. The clerestory windows and twelve-foot wide rolling glass doors are mahogany-framed. Recipient of the Chicago AIA Distinguished Building Award.
- Dallas Courtyard House :: Dallas, TX
- The house is in large part a gallery designed to accommodate the owner’s art and furniture collection. The structure is framed in white painted steel with white aluminum panels and clear and translucent glass infill. Granite and teakwood floors with glass bridges and stairs accent the otherwise white environment. Geothermal wells lie beneath the front yard, and sunscreens and automatic shades are used for energy control. Recipient of the Chicago AIA Distinguished Building Award.
Recently Completed
- Northfield House :: Northfield, IL
- Dunes Compound :: Leelanau County, MI
- North Shore House :: Kenilworth, IL
- Librarian's House :: Shelby, MI