An insider’s guide to the architecture of Kansas City’s Country Club Plaza

This story was first printed in KCUR’s Artistic Journey e-newsletter. You may signal as much as obtain tales like this in your inbox each Tuesday.

The Nation Membership Plaza celebrated its a hundredth anniversary final month, and wrapped up in that milestone are 100 years of structure, festivities, and even bizarre historical past. KCUR’s podcast A Individuals’s Historical past of Kansas Metropolis not too long ago commemorated the event by exploring the difficult legacy of the famed district.

When J.C. Nichols developed his plan for the Plaza within the early Nineteen Twenties, he envisioned greater than a mere purchasing heart. “Nichols’ imaginative and prescient for a much bigger purchasing vacation spot crystalized right into a plan to remodel that swamp mattress property alongside Brush Creek,” host Suzanne Hogan describes within the episode.

Nichols’ difficult legacy of racist actual property practices has resulted within the renaming of the fountain and parkway that bore his title. Regardless of this historical past, Nichols’ preliminary imaginative and prescient for the Plaza stays, as many see it as a vacationer vacation spot or a spot to have a good time household occasions.

One draw for locals and vacationers alike stays the Plaza’s distinctive Spanish-style structure. The Plaza has modified immensely over the course of the final century, however there are a variety of architectural gems that date again to the district’s basis. Others have been constructed within the many years since.

Be taught extra concerning the historical past of those locations you’ll have handed dozens of instances with out figuring out their significance.

Mill Creek Constructing

Opened in 1923, the Mill Creek Constructing was J.C. Nichols’ first industrial constructing on the Nation Membership Plaza. It nonetheless stands at present at 4646 Mill Creek Parkway, throughout the road from the fountain at Mill Creek Park.

The constructing was initially referred to as the Suydam constructing after its unique occupants: Suydam Integrated, a purveyor of high-end “objets d’arts” and inside items.

It was the primary instance of the Plaza’s notable Spanish-style structure, a marked departure from conventional native conventions. “Kansas Metropolis builders up to now have been afraid of coloration, within the sense, for example, that it’s being utilized in California,” famous a 1923 Kansas Metropolis Star article.

Applauding architect Edward Buehler Delk’s design, the identical article famous that “unstinted reward from architects has been gained by the enterprise construction.”

The constructing has housed an assortment of tenants over time and is now residence to the locally-owned restaurant Rye Plaza.

Nelle Peters District

One other notable section of Plaza structure has much less to do with Spanish affect, and extra to do with the essential lady behind the buildings.

Famed Kansas Metropolis architect Nelle Peters is believed to have designed round 1,000 buildings within the Kansas Metropolis space. This makes her “one of the vital prolific architects in Kansas Metropolis through the Nineteen Twenties,” in line with Jason Roe of the Kansas Metropolis Public Library.

Peters achieved this wonderful feat at a time when feminine architects had been uncommon, and developed her personal model. “She was the native pioneer of sitting flats round a central courtyard,” describes Jill Canon in a 1995 Kansas Metropolis Star article.

The Nelle E. Peters Thematic District in West Plaza was designated in 1989. It consists of six condominium buildings named after literary and inventive figures together with Mark Twain, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Paul Cézanne. Peters designed these buildings in 1928 and 1929.

Cezanne, pictured above, is at 712 W. forty eighth Avenue. The Peters Thematic District is at forty eighth Avenue, with buildings on Jefferson Avenue, Roanoke Parkway and Ward Parkway.

In 2016, three of Peters’s tudor-style condominium buildings on the 4700 block of Summit Avenue had been demolished. Whereas many fought to protect the landmarks, the Kansas Metropolis Council voted down a proposal to grant the buildings historic preservation standing.

Seventh Church of Christ Scientist

Perched on the hill on the northwest nook of forty seventh and Pennsylvania Avenue sits the Seventh Church of Christ, Scientist, opened in 1942. The church is “thought of one of many metropolis’s most interesting examples of Romanesque Revival structure,” in line with Kevin Collison.

The church was designed by Indianapolis architect G. Wilbur Foster to “harmonize with the Spanish structure of the Nation Membership Plaza district,” in line with a 1941 Star article.

If you wish to see the church, you’ll have to behave rapidly, because the constructing’s future is in limbo. “Drake Growth, of Overland Park, needs to tear it down and substitute it with a nine-story constructing that can home eating places, luxurious condominiums, and leisure,” as KCUR’s Jacob Martin reported in April 2022.

The group Historic Kansas Metropolis Basis is advocating in opposition to the demolition of the historic church.

Nation Membership Plaza Theater Constructing

With its tower and ornate stonework, the previous Nation Membership Plaza Theater Constructing on the southwest nook of forty seventh and Wyandotte Streets is a sight to behold in and of itself. The movie show was a essential attraction within the Plaza’s early days, however the constructing additionally has a lot earlier historic connections.

Throughout its 1928 building, employees uncovered a 2.5-pound mastodon tooth.

The previous Plaza Theater embodied the district’s Spanish theme each in and out. It contained “two parking stations, handled in a completely new approach, with a low tile cap wall, previous Spanish gates, fountains, shrubbery and bushes,” in line with a 1928 Star article.

The constructing had a protracted life as a theater, working till 1999 when the competing (and now closed) Cinemark movie show moved close by into 526 Nichols Street. The theater was additionally the house of the Kansas Metropolis Philharmonic for a interval within the Sixties.

Although the constructing is at present closed, indicators point out {that a} retailer referred to as KC Type Haus will open in late spring 2022.

Plaza Medical Constructing

Upon its 1937 completion, a Jack Henry’s commercial excitedly dubbed the Plaza Medical Constructing “Kansas Metropolis’s most stunning construction!” Positioned at 315 Nichols Street, the constructing’s essential entrance is flanked by colourful tiled murals. Its second story is adorned with a tower and tiling across the home windows.

Because the 1937 Star commercial detailed, the constructing comprises “brilliantly coloured tile from previous Mexico … attention-grabbing plaques … vintage iron balconies from Spain … gentle tone, hand-made tiles in variegated colours.”

Earlier than the Plaza Medical Constructing’s building, the land was as soon as the positioning of the Plaza canine mart. On September twenty second, 1934, “Nation Membership Plaza retailers sponsored a canine mart the place individuals eager about shopping for a canine might see and examine many breeds of canine,” in line with the State Historic Society of Missouri – Kansas Metropolis.

Boy and Frog Fountain

There are after all many statues and fountains to see on the Plaza. In style locations embody The Neptune fountain close to forty seventh and Central Avenue, the Ben Franklin statue close to forty seventh and Jefferson Avenue, and the Wild Boar of Florence close to forty seventh and Wornall Street.

One small fountain so as to add to your listing is immediately throughout from the Plaza Medical Constructing. The Boy and Frog fountain sits proper exterior of the Starbucks at 302 Nichols Street. The statue was designed in Florence by Raffaello Romanelli, and was dropped at Kansas Metropolis in 1929.

“Although it seems the chubby youngster is gleefully peeing into the frog’s mouth, the amphibian is definitely the one spitting the water,” comically describes the positioning Atlas Obscura. “Crouching under the boy and his frog good friend is a grumpy trying faun [sic] driving atop a dolphin who seems to be none too happy to be caught holding up the marble basin.”

Atlas Obscura additionally particulars that the fountain was not too long ago the topic of drama. It reported that the frog went lacking in February 2021, and that by June 2021, “the frog is again, though lacking its proper entrance leg.”

This isn’t the primary time the fountain was concerned in a theft. The infant was stolen in 1960, however was happily discovered later in close by bushes, reported the Star in 2016.

This compilation solely scratches the floor. You probably have the time, the Nation Membership Plaza has created a number of themed scavenger hunts. The William T. Kemper basis has additionally put collectively a 36-page Plaza strolling tour with historic reflections on the district. It comprises 50 notable sights to see within the district.

Need extra adventures like this? Join KCUR’s Artistic Journey E-mail.