Philip Johnson – 1906-2005

Johnson was one of America’s most influential architects, whose designs helped define the modern cityscape. He was an exponent of the so-called International Style, originated by Mies van der Rohe, which featured elegant minimalist lines, with a generous use of glass. Beginning in the 1950s, Johnson incorporated historical allusions and curvilinear forms in his work, and by the 1980s—with the American Telephone and Telegraph headquarters in New York City (1982)—he had become a defining architect of the more playful postmodern style.