History 301: Columbus, Indiana, is an architectural amusement park

By Connie Zeigler

The economy is bad. We can’t all afford to get away to somewhere cool for a vacation.

Eero Saarinen’s North Christian Church in a setting designed by noted landscape architect Dan Kiley.

Lucky for us, there’s a cool place just down the road. Architecturally cool, that is. Columbus, Indiana, that is.

World-renowned architecture is less than an hour away from Downtown Indianapolis. In fact, Columbus is such a turn-on to architecturephiles that, not long ago, 15 modern-architecture bloggers from across the nation high-tailed it to that small city for a VIP tour of the places and spaces that make Columbus off-the-charts amazing. Because of my blog, “INArchitecture,” I was one of the lucky 15.

National Historic Landmarks and dozens of properties on the National Register of Historic Places fill that city.

Because of its small size, Columbus also happens to be one of the best kept secrets in architecture. A mere 45 miles away from the state capital, but even in Indianapolis if you tell a friend you’re going to Columbus, he or she will probably assume you mean the one in Ohio. So, here’s some good advice for all you architecture, landscape, or design mavens. Drive to Columbus and bask in some world-famous works by world-famous architects.

There you’ll find dozens of buildings important enough to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places – and six so important they are listed as National Historic Landmarks. And by the way, that’s only two fewer National Historic Landmarks than there are in Indianapolis. And Columbus is a town with only 39,000 residents. And their NHL properties were designated even though not all of them are 50 years old, which means that the National Park Service considers them so important they made an exception of their standards for them.

But that is only partly why, if you are a modern architecture buff, this is the place for you. A veritable pantheon of architects filled the city streets and suburban drives of this city with remarkable and nationally significant buildings. According to Smithsonian Magazine and the Columbus Visitors Center, as early as 1942, J. Irwin Miller, owner of Cummins Engine Company, began to bring top-notch architects and cutting-edge design to Columbus.

That first foray into great modern design resulted in Eliel Saarinen’s First Christian Church, one of the city’s National Historic Landmarks. It also brought about a lasting friendship between J. Irwin Miller and Eliel Saarinen’s son, Eero. That friendship gave Columbus two more of its National Historic Landmarks, the Irwin Union Bank building (now First Financial ) and the J. Irwin Miller home, recently purchased by the Indianapolis Museum of Art. Eero was the architect for both of those buildings (as well as Columbus’s North Christian Church – also, by the way, a National Historic Landmark). Just in case you haven’t heard of him, he also happened to design the St. Louis Arch and the Knoll Tulip Table, a ’50s iconic furniture design.

Eero’s friend from Cranbrook Academy of Art (where his father, Eliel, was teacher and mentor to a generation of modernists) was Charles Eames. Eames filled the J. Irwin Miller home with furniture of his own design, including prototypes for the famous “Aluminum Group,” which the Millers used on their patio. And while they sipped cocktails from their Eames chairs, the Millers and their guests must have gazed contentedly at the landscape designed by another young Turk modernist, landscape architect Dan Kiley.

These designers and their work are ranked among the highest of the high in the nation. And this handful of designs is just the whipped cream on the top of the sumptuous, double-mocha latte of Columbus architecture.

In the 1950s Cummins Engine Co. began a funding program to keep Columbus on the architectural cutting edge. With Cummins funding architectural fees, Columbus has continued to attract the most famous architects of the day in every era since Eliel Saarinen built the Frist Christian Church. The Architects Collective, Harry Weese, who built the First Baptist Church, another National Historic Landmark, as well as several private residences in Columbus; Skidmore Owings and Merrill, a Chicago and New York firm started by two Indiana boys, which became famous for its New York City Lever House skyscraper; Edward Larrabee Barnes (Walker Art Museum, Minneapolis and IBM HQ NYC); Roache Dinkeloo, which also designed the Pyramids in Indianapolis, Robert Venturi, proclaimed by Indianapolis’s most famous architect, Evans Woollen, to be one of his personal favorites. Dozens of award-winning designs and designers had their way with Columbus, Indiana.

Even if you don’t give a hoot for modern architecture, Columbus is still a great architectural town to visit. Downtown Columbus has a courthouse by Isaac Hodgson; the Crump Theatre, a fabulously Art Deco style building lovingly restored; a curved-facade Art Moderne fire station from the 1930s; and a restored 1900 ice cream parlor with its original pipe organ and an owner with a winning story about returning it to its original splendor.

Columbus is a jewel full of jaw-dropping architecture from every decade and in every style. But its shines most brightly with modernism from the 1940s to the 2000s.

So, even though it’s going to be a long, hot summer, Columbus is cool. Fifteen bloggers with a love of modern architecture found that out this year. You should, too.

Connie Zeigler is president and owner of C. Resources, Inc. Connie is a writer and a historic preservationist who consults on preservation and greening of historic buildings. She lives in Fountain Square and blogs at INArchitecture on cresourcesinc.blogspot.com.