Inspiration: St. Louis by Leonard Major

I recently got back from St. Louis, MO for the St. Louis Galleria Store (240) opening and found the whole experience quite inspiring!  From the amazing new store, to the fabulous art,  to the Tudor style architecture, "Middle-America/ Middle-Earth" ain't half bad!  let's talk about some of the things that moved me!

FOREST PARK

Forest Park was built in 1904 for the World Fair, Louisiana Purchase Exposition and is one of the biggest urban parks in the United States at 1,371 acres...500 acres more than New Yorks Central Park, and designed by the same Landscape Architect.  In 1874 the General Assembly passed the Forest Park Act, which established the park and created a county-wide property tax to fund it.  This allowed all the parks features to be free for the general public, including The Saint Louis Art Museum, Science Center, Zoo and History Museum.

http://stlouis.missouri.org/citygov//parks/forestpark/

TUDOR  ARCHITECTURE

During the Tudor Revival (1910-1940) manyof the Tudor style homes were built by European-trained architects for the wealthy in St. Louis, MO.  Often taking inspiration from it's European predecessors, even at times using exact floor plan copies.  The houses fit perfectly in the lush scenic landscape of STL. Many are identified with false (ornamental) half-timbering, a medieval English building tradition, often with stucco or masonry veneered walls, steeply pitched roof, cross-gabled plans. A varient of this is sometimes referred to as the Picturesque Cottage or English Cottage, which typically includes a picturesque (asymmetrical) floor plan but without the half timbering. A whimsical variant of the Tudor Revival is the playful Storybook Style, also known as the Cotswold Cottage or Hansel and Gretel.

ST. LOUIS GATEWAY ARCH

The Gateway Arch was designed by Finnish American architect Eero Saarinen and structural engineer Hannskarl Bandel in 1947. Construction began on February 12, 1963, and ended on October 28, 1965, costing 13 million US Dollars at the time ($90,491,005 today). The monument opened to the public on June 10, 1967.  The Gateway Arch, or Gateway to the West, is an arch that is the centerpiece of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial in St. Louis, Missouri. It was built as a monument to the westward expansion of the United States. At 630 feet (192 m), it is the tallest man-made monument in the United States, Missouri's second tallest accessible building, and the largest architectural structure designed as a weighted or flattened catenary arch.  One of the most fascination things to me at least, is that the idea of the Arch was conceived 30 years before it was completed!