Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S.

As one of the most respected architects of the 20th Century, Eero Saarinen’s design for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s chapel is a simple cylindrical volume that has a complex and mystical quality within. Saarinen’s simple design is overshadowed by the interior form and light that were meant to awaken spirituality in the visitor. Due to the windowless façade, the interior of the chapel is completely masked by the exterior of the volume. Unlike the smooth uninterrupted façade, the interior brick walls undulate around the circumference of the chapel, which creates a new spatial dynamic that is illuminated by the moat that slips into the interior from outside. →

 Eero Saarinen 

Eero Saarinen (1910 – 1961) was a Finnish American architect and industrial designer of the 20th century famous for shaping his neofuturistic style according to the demands of the project: simple, sweeping, arching structural curves or machine-like rationalism. Saarinen is now considered one of the masters of American 20th-century architecture. →