Michael Graves was an American architect. Identified as one of The New York Five, as well as Memphis Group, Graves was known first for his contemporary building designs and some prominent public commissions that became iconic examples of Postmodern architecture, such as the Portland Building and Denver Public Library. His recognition grew through designing domestic products sold by premium Italian housewares maker Alessi, and later low-cost new designs at stores such as Target and J. C. Penney in the United States.^[1] He was a representative of New Urbanism and New Classical Architecture and formerly designed postmodern buildings, and was recognized as a major influence in all three movements.

Michael Graves was one of the most prominent and influential architects and designers of the late- 20th and early- 21st centuries. In his buildings and in his furniture and housewares, Graves embodied the essence of Postmodernism — a refined classicism inflected with a humanistic sense of joy.

The Indiana-born Graves attended the University of Cincinnati’s architectural program and continued his studies at Harvard as well as at the American Academy in Rome. In 1962, he began teaching at Princeton, and remained there throughout his career. Following a seminal 1972 Museum of Modern Art group survey of rising modernist architects, Graves, along with Richard Meier, Charles Gwathmey, Peter Eisenman and John Hejduk, gained fame as a member of the “New York Five.” But even then Graves was looking to break from the monotony of modernism. Graves projects such as the Portland Building in Oregon (1982) and the Humana Building in Louisville, Kentucky (1985) would usher in postmodernism—a new architectural language employing symbolic color and a clever redux of classical elements, such as keystones and pilasters, blown up to cartoonishly large proportions.

Courtesy of Diane Villani Editions