Renown Architect Features Whitefriars Hall

We shall all agree that the fundamental aspect of the novel is its story-telling aspect…Yes—oh, dear, yes—the novel tells a story…That is the highest factor common to all novels, and I wish that it was not so, that it could be something different—melody, or perception of the truth..” E.M. Forster

“Americans who graduated from architecture school in the decade following World War II were a special, some would say, elite, group,” said Thomas Schumacher, professor of architecture at the University of Maryland. And this group had in its class one extraordinary architect, Frank Schlesinger. Schlesinger began his career in the mid-1950’s toward the end of the first decade after the War. In his book, The Architecture of Frank Schlesinger, Grayson Publishing, LLC, Washington, DC, many of his works are prominently displayed including one in particular, Whitefriars Hall in Washington, DC. Schumacher stated that Frank’s primary materials of brick and wood are used to display the clarity of plan organization, simplicity of volume, and a sensitivity to site that his precedents demonstrate as a style solely to his own. His design of Whitefriars was enhanced further when additions to the Hall were made in 1989. Hence it is fair to say the Schlesinger’s buildings are to architecture what Forster explains above is the novel’s relation to literature: construction, function and structure of course, but beyond that, the aspiration to develop expressive, elegant and meaningful architecture as a result.

While over 39 buildings are viewed in this book, it is fair to say that hundreds of others didn’t make the visual cut but are still wonderfully designed buildings that are solidly in service today.

We recognize the great successes of architect Frank Schlesinger, and congratulate him on his accomplishments and thank him for the great architecture achievements of Whitefriars Hall.