Artist Birthday: Michael Graves

Michael Graves was a leading proponent of revival of ornament and classical forms in architecture that was a key to the Postmodernism movement in architecture and design. Out the window was the International Style's obsession with no decoration, or, as they stressed, "form follows function".

Artist Birthday for 9 July: Michael Graves (1934-2015 US)

Michael Graves, Dolphin Hotel, Walt Disney World, Orlando, FL, 1989   Photo © 2025 Micha L. Rieser (DAH-1628)

Graves channeled the fantasy/entertainment architecture of Disney World and the dominant tropical/ocean culture of Florida to design his joined Swan and Dolphin Hotels. The Dolphin Hotel relies on the basic shapes of classical architecture: the circle, square and triangle. These basic masses are given interesting twists with Graves's water-themed murals, gigantic sculptures, and extensive installation of fountains and water cascades.

 The peach and teal colors on the exterior are repeated on the interior, as do the marine life and floral motifs. After fourteen years, Graves completely redesigned the interior, replacing furniture with his own designs in more sophisticated, sleek work. Everything from wastebaskets to curtains were replaced with updated Graves designs.

Background 

The energy and dominance of glass-box high rise type of architecture -- elevated two stories above the street on pillotis ("stilts"), the International Style, which had dominated American architecture since the late 1940s -- ran out of steam starting in the early 1970s.

Many architects in the early 1970s were determined to reunite people with buildings. One way they sought to achieve this goal was by accommodating buildings' surroundings with their designs. Glass curtain walls were rejected in favor of the warm textures of granite, marble and other stones.

Postmodern designs drew freely from a variety of styles, ranging from antiquity to Art Nouveau and the Vienna Secession. Architects borrow and blend influences from a variety of periods using modern construction techniques that recall the past in a vigorous new way.

Michael Graves was born in Indiana, interested in drawing and painting at an early age. His earliest architectural experience came while he studied architecture at the University of Cincinnati. He did graduate work in architecture at Harvard, and won in 1960 the Prix de Rome to spend two years at the American Academy in Rome.

While in Rome, he not only learned all about classical architecture and its impact on Renaissance and Baroque work, but also about the criticism of architecture. In 1962 he began teaching architecture at Princeton University, emphasizing the relationship of buildings to landscape, traditional elements of architecture, metaphor and architecture, and the origins of furniture.

Correlations to Davis programs: Exploring Visual Design 4E, Chapter 9 Contrast -- Contrasts of Time and Style; The Visual Experience 3E, Chapter 11 Architecture, 11.5 -- 1950s to Present/Contemporary