Skip to Content

William S. Huff collection on Louis I. Kahn

 Collection — Multiple Containers
Identifier: MS-0139-0001

Scope and Content Note

The William S. Huff collection on Louis I. Kahn contain a complete set of drawings for the Tribune Review Publishing Company building in Greensburg, Pennsylvania and drawings for the Margaret Esherick House in Philadelphia. Also included are an extensive collection of newspaper clippings and periodical articles about Kahn, photographs and slides of other buildings designed by Kahn (Salk Institute for Biological Studies, Yale University Art Gallery addition, Yale Center for British Art, Carborundum Company Warehouse and Office, and First Unitarian Church and Community Center, Rochester, New York), correspondence with Kahn, correspondence with others about Kahn's work, and correspondence with Kahn's widow Esther Israeli Kahn and others pertaining to passage of legislation by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to purchase Kahn's papers. There are also numerous small, original works by Kahn, and ephemera. Transcripts of interviews by Alvaro Malo on four of Kahn's buildings--Yale Center for British Art, Kimbell Art Museum, Phillips Exeter Library, and Salk Institute for Biological Studies--and books about Kahn and his work are also included.

Dates

  • 1949-2012

Creator

Language of Materials

Collection material primarily in English.

Terms of Access

The William S. Huff collection on Louis I. Kahn, 1949-2012 is open for research. The collection is not fully processed; an inventory is available in Special Collections, University Libraries, State University of New York at Buffalo.

Copyright

Copyright of papers in the collection may be held by their authors, or the authors' heirs or assigns. Researchers must obtain the written permission of the holder(s) of copyright and the University Archives before publishing quotations from materials in th collection. Most papers may be copied in accordance with the library's usual procedures unless otherwise specified.

Biographical Note

Louis I. Kahn was born in Estonia and raised in Philadelphia. He was trained in architecture in the Beaux-Arts tradition at the University of Pennsylvania under Paul Philippe Cret. As a mature architect, Kahn was distinguished from his contemporaries (in a period dominated by the International Style) by his unique personal philosophy of architecture and a style marked by a profound sense of history and pure geometry in design and the texture of materials in construction. His legacy is as much in his teaching and his unbuilt designs as in his major built works. He lectured and wrote on architecture beginning in the 1930s. He taught at Yale University (1947-1955) and was Cret Professor of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania from 1956 until his death (Louis I. Kahn Collection, University of Pennsylvania and Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission).



William S. Huff was born on June 8, 1927, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. After serving in the Navy during World War II, Huff attended Yale University where he received his undergraduate degrees (1949, 1952) and his master's degree (1972).

Huff first became aware of Louis I. Kahn in 1947 when he was a student at Yale, and Kahn was a visiting critic. In 1956 Huff decided that he wanted to either work for Kahn or study in Europe. When Kahn did not have an opening, Huff secured a Fulbright and went to Ulm, Germany to study at the Hochschule für Gestaltung. Huff began working in Kahn's office in Philadelphia in 1958. Between 1958 and 1962, Huff was in charge of the project to construct the Tribune Review Publishing Company building in Greensburg, Pennsylvania. Huff left Kahn's office in 1962. Huff discussed Kahn's association with Yale in his article, "Kahn and Yale" ( Journal of architectural education: JAE, v.35, no.3 (Spring 1982), pp. 22-31. See also, Huff's "Louis Kahn: sorted recollections and lapses in familiarities," Little journal, v.5, no.1 (Sept. 1981)

William S. Huff was a dedicated educator, teaching architecture at Carnegie Institute of Technology, Carnegie-Mellon University and the State University of New York at Buffalo.

William S. Huff died on January 21, 2021.

Extent

28 Linear Feet (13 boxes, 6 map drawers)

Abstract

The William S. Huff collection on Louis I. Kahn contains a complete set of drawings for the Tribune Review Publishing Company building in Greensburg, Pennsylvania and drawings for the Margaret Esherick House in Philadelphia. Also included are an extensive collection of newspaper clippings and periodical articles about Kahn, photographs and slides of other buildings designed by Kahn (Salk Institute for Biological Studies, Yale University Art Gallery addition, Yale Center for British Art, Carborundum Company Warehouse and Office, and First Unitarian Church and Community Center, Rochester, New York), correspondence with Kahn, correspondence with others about Kahn's work, and correspondence with Kahn's widow Esther Israeli Kahn and others pertaining to passage of legislation by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to purchase Kahn's papers. There are also numerous small, original works by Kahn, and ephemera. Transcripts of interviews by Alvaro Malo on four of Kahn's buildings--Yale Center for British Art, Kimbell Art Museum, Phillips Exeter Library, and Salk Institute for Biological Studies--and books about Kahn and his work are also included.

Arrangement

A detailed inventory is available on site. The collection is not fully processed and has not been arranged in series.

Other Finding Aid

A partial inventory, created and annotated by William Huff, is available online at https://library.buffalo.edu/archives/pdf/ms-139-1-public-partial-inventory.pdf

Acquisition Information

The The William S. Huff collection on Louis I. Kahn was a gift to the University Archives, donated by William S. Huff, 2006-2012.

Accruals and Additions

Further accruals are expected to this collection.

Related Resources

MS 139, William S. Huff collection the Hochschule für Gestaltung Ulm, 1953-2012
MS 139.2, William S. Huff papers, 1952-1988

Processing Information

Collection is unprocessed.
Finding aid encoded by Danielle White, August 2014.

Source

Title
Finding Aid for the William S. Huff collection on Louis I. Kahn
Status
Unprocessed
Author
Finding aid prepared by Archives staff.
Date
2012
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
Undetermined
Script of description
Code for undetermined script
Language of description note
English

Repository Details

Part of the University Archives Repository

Contact:
420 Capen Hall
Buffalo New York 14260-1674 US
716-645-2916
716-645-3714 (Fax)