Chicago
Athenaeum
The Chicago Athenaeum was started in 1988 as the
country's only independent museum of architecture and design,
and is dedicated to the art of design in all areas of
discipline, industrial and product design, architecture, urban
planning and graphics. Their new International Sculpture Park
occupies 20 acres of land in the city, and introduces a cultural
resource that includes international and American sculpture
works that have been strictly picked to fit the natural
environment of the lovely park. Since they opened, the museum
has continued to build a magnificent collection of important
examples of industrial design by the world's most prominent
architects and designers from the 20th and 21st centuries. One
of the more significant include those objects that have been
made in Chicago from 1900 to 1960, when the city had become the
center of design and manufacturing in the nation, with a
collection that includes; the Industrial Design exhibit that
houses numerous pioneering examples of modern technology from
televisions, radios and cameras to graphics, business equipment
and home appliances. Another is the Early Women in Design: Anne
Swainson and Ellen Manderfield with a marvelous collection of
photographs, drawings and product designs from two significant
early American industrial designers that worked in the city from
1930 to 1960. Ann, who was born in Sweden, founded the
Montgomery Ward Bureau of Design in Chicago in 1930 that would
become the first corporate industrial design department in
modern history. One of her most famous employees was Ellen
Manderfield who would have a brilliant career in house wares
until the 1980s. Another outstanding exhibit is the History of
Modern Graphic Design that contains original examples of early
modern graphic design from 1930 to 1960 that includes logo
types, posters, advertising, corporate logos, typography,
handbooks, print and promotional materials, books and brochures.
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