Greene and Greene
Brothers Charles Sumner and Henry Mather Greene, commonly referred to as Greene and Greene, were born just outside of Cincinnati, Ohio in 1868 and 1870, respectively. They grew up primarily on their mother's family farm in West Virginia while their father attended medical school. The love of natural detail and rough-hewn materials that they developed during this period of their lives became a mark of their later projects.
As teenagers, the brothers studied at the Manual Training School at Washington University. They studied metal and woodworking primarily, and both read voraciously on topics of architecture, furnituremaking and carpentry, ceramics and related subjects.
Their father, a practicing physician by this point, was very concerned with the need for sunlight and circulating fresh air; the importance of these elements was to eventually become one of the signatures of the brothers' best work.
At MIT's School of Architecture, they studied classical building styles, hoping at that time only to gain certification for apprenticeships with architecture and construction firms upon graduation, which they accomplished.
In 1893 their parents requested that the sons move out to Pasadena, California, where they had retired to a few years earlier. The brothers agreed and while driving there from Boston they stopped at the World's Columbian Exhibition in Chicago and saw a few examples of Japanese architecture, which made a lasting impression on both of them.
They set up shop together in Pasadena, eventually building toward the crescendo of their "ultimate bungalows" (such as the Gamble House in Pasadena, generally considered one of the finest examples of residential architecture in the United States). Such ultimate bungalows were completely custom affairs, where the vast majority of ingredients – light fixtures, furniture, tile, even woven textiles – were created for a specific space in the home.
References
- Mackinson, Randall. Greene and Greene.
- Greene and Greene Virtual Archives at the University of Southern California.