At the intersection of 13th Street and Michigan Avenue in Chicago?s South Loop there stands an art deco building with strong vertical pillars and textbook, streamlined organic ornamentation. No plaque marks the building, and the city?s online database identifies it only as an office building from the 1920s by Graven, A.S. It?s the only reference to the work of this particular firm in the Chicago Historic Resources Survey, a 10-year effort to catalog important buildings. In a city overflowing with iconic, turn-of-the-century skyscrapers and high-rises, it doesn?t draw much attention. But it?s far from the firm?s only work, in the city or elsewhere. A 24-story office building still stands at 100 N. LaSalle Street, festooned with the same ornamentation as its cousin in the South Loop. Another stands nearby at 232 S. Wabash, noted in the survey but unattributed. They?re relics of a firm that had a brief, shining run designing palatial buildings across the country in the early 20th century. Anker Sverre Graven was the principal of an eponymous architectural firm when it was located at 100 N. LaSalle. He had originally founded a firm with his longtime partner, Arthur Guy Mayger, in 1926, and the pair went on to design a string of fantastic theaters across the United States.
For the most part, their work stands forgotten. If not for the interest of a former colleague, a little luck, and the recent discovery of the firm?s forgotten archives, much of Graven and May...