Linggu Pagoda

Ginling College (in the posting immediately above) served as a showcase for the skills of a talented and thoughtful American architect, Henry Killam Murphy. Murphy is not particularly well known in the U.S. (even among architects) – but his fame is well established in China…. in part no doubt because he tended to specialize in the architecture of educational facilities and institutions of higher learning. Peking University, Tsinghua University, Ginling College, and many, many others bear his design imprint… and he was especially active here in Nanjing.

Murphy’s approach came to be called “adaptive architecture,” which sought to apply new ideas about construction, lighting, heating, plumbing, materials, etc. – ideas that were becoming prevalent in his native U.S. practice — within the traditional forms of Chinese design (e.g., graceful, curving roofs; colorful & intricate dougong [brackets, cornices] under the eaves; etc.). He wanted his buildings to look Chinese – but to be world-class in their structure and form and operations.

His practice in Nanjing was helped by his relationship with the Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-Shek, who pushed the city – China’s capital at that time – to the forefront of urban design & reconstruction. Murphy helped in city planning, & was a strong proponent of keeping Nanjing’s city wall intact. “It would be a great mistake to tear it down,” he wrote, even though other Chinese cities were doing so at the time (& last November’s posting certainly indicates the wisdom of that judgement!).

Sturdy pagoda stairs

Murphy was chosen by the KMT government to design and build what he referred to as “China’s Arlington” – a memorial cemetery & building complex for ‘revolutionary martyrs’ erected in the Linggu Temple area of Purple Mountain. He was “greatly thrilled” about the prospect of designing a pagoda for the site, since his design would utilize reinforced concrete (still a relatively new technique in China), and could similarly embody “…ideas I have been gradually working out in my mind for many years for the most beautiful pagoda in China.” And so, on a recent weekend, I made it a point to visit (and climb!) Murphy’s nine-story Linggu Pagoda. I can attest – and the above photo shows – that it is indeed very beautiful; and a second photo gives some hint of its sturdy – indeed very sturdy! – concrete steps & inside construction.

The quotes above are from a wonderfully written guide to Murphy and his work, Jeffrey Cody’s book Building in China: Henry K. Murphy’s “Adaptive Architecture,” 1914-1935. In addition to cogently telling Murphy’s fascinating story, the book includes a number of other tidbits that I found quite interesting. Despite having taught for many years in the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Design, for example, I hadn’t realized that that school was the favorite amongst Chinese architects of that period (e.g., in 1931, 12 of the 28 U.S. university graduates in the Society of Chinese Architects had gone there). Similarly, I hadn’t realized that Edmund Bacon, the renowned Philadelphia city planner (and yes, probably forever better known as father of the actor Kevin Bacon) had worked for Murphy in his Shanghai office during the early 1930’s Depression.