1939 NEW YORK WORLDS FAIR BLUEPRINT-EXTREMELY RARE!!!!!

Home > Worthopedia – Price Guide > Advertising >

Terms and Conditions for using our site

1939 NEW YORK WORLDS FAIR BLUEPRINT-EXTREMELY RARE!!!!!

Sold For:

or Sign In to see what it's worth.

Sold Date: 03/16/2008
Channel: Online Auction
Source: eBay
Category: Advertising

1939 NEW YORK WORLDS FAIR BLUEPRINT-EXTREMELY RARE!!!!!

This original blueprint dated August 10, 1938 is of the Suspended Aluminum Bridge in the Pennsylvania Exhibit. The blueprint is from the famed office of Architects/Designers Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer. In collaboration with Marcel Breuer, Walter Gropius built the Pennsylvania Pavilion for the 1939 New York World's Fair. The title block states "Pennsylvania Exhibit New york World's Fair 1939."

The bridge later came to be known as the Unity Bridge inside the Pennsylvania Building. "From the Unity Bridge, a curved steel structure suspended from the ceiling, the visitor is provided with a clear view of displays in both the Hall of Democracy and the Hall of Tradition."-From the Official Guide.
The Blueprint measures approximately 28"x 36" and was originally folded. The print is composed of two main drawings-one an elevation view showing the steel suspension cables and the bridge itself. The second shows a plan of the bridge. Two other minor detail drawings are a section thru rail and an end elevation. T are numbers and measurements noted directly on the face in pencil and colored pencil. As stated in the title block in the righthand corner this drawing (no. 8) replaces drawing no. 7. On the reverse white side, written in pencil, is "Return to Mr. Johnson of the Aluminum Co of Amer Gulf Building." T were presumably corrections made in the Gropius/Breuer office which were sent back to the Aluminum contractor. T are two small tears both about an inch along the top and left edges. It has been stored flat and will be shipped in a mailing tube with insurance provided by the seller.

This is a truly remarkable rare piece and certainly one of a kind!!!

HISTORY--Walter Adolph Georg Gropius (May 18, 1883 - July 5, 1969) was a German architect and founder of Bauhaus. He is widely regarded as one of the pioneering masters of "modern" architecture.

Marcel Lajos Breuer (21 May 1902 - 1 July 1981), architect and furniture designer, was an influential Hungarian-born modernist. One of the fathers of Modernism, Breuer studied and taught at the Bauhaus in the 1920s. He later practiced in Berlin, designing houses and commercial spaces, as well as a number of tubular metal furniture pieces, replicas of which are still in production today.

In the 1930s, Gropius and his Bauhaus protégé Marcel Breuer both moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts to teach at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. Breuer dissolved his partnership with Gropius in May 1941.