World`s Columbian Exposition at Chicago :: :: University of Virginia Library

THE ADMINISTRATION BUILDING.

ADMINISTRATION BUILDING COST $435,000

[Description: Illustrations of Administration Building and the U.S. Coast Line Battleship at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. Featuring well-landscaped grounds, women with parasols and a very almost Baroque architecture. The ship is blowing steam and chugging in the water.]

Entering the Exposition grounds at the railway terminal station this building will be the first to greet the eye of a majority of visitors. Its lofty gilded dome is the most conspicuous object on the grounds, rising to a height of two hundred and sixty feet, the height of the famous Auditorium tower in the city of Chicago. Although comparatively small in extent—covering an area but two hundred and fifty square feet-yet it is so richly and ornately decorated, and has such a wealth of artistic design that it is pronounced the gem of the Exposition.

The plan of this building is four Doric pavilions of heroic proportions and eighty-four feet square, which stand at the four angles of the square, and support a great central dome one hundred and twenty feet in diameter and two hundred and twenty feet high. Four grand entrances, fifty feet wide and fifty feet high, admit the public. Above each entrance are semicircular arched vaults, and above the arches -are great screens of glass, admitting light to the central rotunda.

The whole structure is richly adorned with carvings, sculpture, paintings and stained glass. The arrangement of all is in accord with tile most artistic taste. Particularly grand is the great central dome, which rises two hundred feet above the floor. Its interior is enriched by deep molded panels, filled with low relief sculpture and by immense paintings, representing the arts and sciences. The rotunda rivals, if it does not surpass the most celebrated domes of the world.