Emmanuel Louis Masqueray (1861–1917) was a Franco-American preeminent figure in the history of American architecture, both as a gifted designer of landmark buildings and as an influential teacher of the profession of architecture dedicated to the principles of Beaux-Arts architecture.
In 1893, Masqueray opened the Atelier Masqueray, for the study of architecture according to French methods; architect Walter B. Chambers shared in this enterprise. Located at 123 E. 23rd Street, this was the first wholly independent atelier opened in the United States. A colorful, dynamic teacher, Masqueray pleaded with his students to make things simple.[6] Beginning in 1899, Masqueray made special provision for women to number among his architectural students by establishing a second atelier especially for women at 37–40 West 22nd Street in New York. As was said at the time, "...he has unbounded faith in women's ability to succeed in architecture...provided they go about it seriously."[7]
Increasingly, architectural historians are making the connection between the work of Masqueray and those who studied with him. It is important to have a list of those who were his students over the next decade in New York, in order to foster further awareness and research. According to contemporary published accounts of the exhibitions of the Atelier Masqueray, those who were his students include:
This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.
Roy Corwin Crosby (architect of houses on the Palisades)
Clarence E. Decker (later of Decker and Stevenson, architects of the YWCA, San Diego)
Mortimer Foster (later of Foster, Gade and Graham)
Frederick George Frost, Sr. (principal of his own firm in New York City which later included his son and namesake), Hall of Fashion, New York 1939 World's Fair
Sylvester S. McGrath (later of the firm Davis, McGrath & Kiessling, architects of among many others, Gramercy East Professional Building, 115 East 23rd Street, New York City)
Francis S. "Frank" Swales (later of the firm Painter & Swales; designer of Selfridges' Store, Oxford Street, London, and The Brussels Exposition of 1910's Canadian Pacific Railway Pavilion)
Wilison Joseph Wythe (assistant professor of drawing, University of California)
In 1897, Masqueray left the Hunt office to work for Warren & Wetmore, also in New York City, Whitney Warren having been his fellow student at the École des Beaux Arts, Paris.[8] Work underway while Masqueray was with the firm includes: New York Yacht Club (1898), Westmorly, Harvard, MA (1898), High Tide (William Starr Miller house), 79 Ocean Avenue, Newport, Rhode Island, (1900), The Racquet House at Tuxedo Club, Tuxedo Park, NY, (1890-1900), and the Mrs. Orme Wilson residence (now the India Consulate), 3 East 64th St., New York (1900–03). He was responsible for the design of the Long Island College Hospital in Brooklyn.
His reputation became international in 1901 when the commissioner of architects of the St. Louis Exposition selected him to be Chief of Design. Masqueray in turn employed Louis C. Spiering (a fellow alumnus of the École des Beaux-Arts) and some of his former students including Frank Swales and George Nagle. As Chief of Design of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, a position he held for three years, Masqueray had architectural oversight of the entire Fair and personally designed the following Fair buildings:
Palace of Agriculture
The Cascades and Colonnades
Palace of Forestry, Fish, and Game
Palace of Horticulture
Palace of Transportation
Design ideas from all of these were widely emulated in civic projects across the United States as part of the City Beautiful Movement. Masqueray resigned shortly after the fair opened in 1904, having been invited by Archbishop John Ireland of St. Paul to come to Minnesota and design the new Cathedral of Saint Paul in Saint Paul for the city.[1]
Masqueray arrived in St. Paul in 1905 and remained there until his death. He designed about two dozen parish churches for Catholic and Protestant congregations in the upper Midwest, including:
Church of St. Peter (1911), St. Peter. This church was destroyed by the 1998 Comfrey–St. Peter tornado outbreak; a new church-school complex was built at a new location west of the city at 1801 West Broadway. The St. Peter Community Center and Public Library occupy the site of the former church.
Masqueray also designed important residences in and around St. Paul (one of which, a 1915 home at 427 Portland Avenue, has been owned by radio personality Garrison Keillor) and "Wind's Eye" in Dellwood MN; several parochial schools for the Catholic Archdiocese of St. Paul; Grace Hall (1912) at the Saint Paul Seminary and Ireland Hall (1912) at the College of Thomas (now University of St. Thomas).
In St. Paul in 1906, Masqueray founded an atelier which continued his Beaux Arts method of architectural training, among his students who trained there, perhaps the best known is Edwin Lundie (1886–1972).[11] Other architects associated with Masqueray in St. Paul were Fred Slifer and Frank Abrahamson.