Finding neighborheads wherever. (Kansas City, St. Louis, Kirkwood: neighborhoods, purchase, law)

[Hazel W]

Is there a Forest Park in or near K.C.?

[sub]

Forest Park as in..?

There’s a small neighborhood on the Kansas side by that name.

If you’re talking about something comparable to the one in St. Louis, KC has Loose Park which is near the Country Club Plaza.
Amenity-wise, Swope Park is huge and has the zoo but the neighborhoods directly around it are generally pretty rough.

[Hazel W]

Originally Posted by sub

Forest Park as in..?

There’s a small neighborhood on the Kansas side by that name.

If you’re talking about something comparable to the one in St. Louis, KC has Loose Park which is near the Country Club Plaza.
Amenity-wise, Swope Park is huge and has the zoo but the neighborhoods directly around it are generally pretty rough.

Oh, good. You know the park. So, to explain, I was reading a news story from Kansas City and my thought was did the writer put it in the wrong city. Evidently not.



Have you seen St Louis's Forest Park? You would love it. It has everything anyone could want for an outing. But not all in one day. And - forgive my prejudice - far outshines Swoop Park or Loose Park



Thank you for the information. I still prefer KC. <g> Hazel

[Weaubleau]

Yeah, KC has nothing like Forest Park. Swope Park is kind of a ragged imitation of it, but at a much, much lower level. Loose Park is a nice city recreation type park, not a all encompassing park like Forest Park.

[MarketStEl]

I would say that Forest Park, which is the primary legacy the Louisiana Purchase Exposition of 1904 left to the City of St. Louis, is more a sculpted environment with plenty of other amenities (e.g., St. Louis Museum of Art) in it — a Frederick Law Olmsted-style park even though I don't believe Olmsted had anything to do with its design.

Kansas City's park and boulevard network began as the work of George Kessler, but I don't believe Kessler had anything to do with sculpting Swope Park. I may be wrong about the part of the park the city annexed when Col. Swope donated it to the city in 1896, but I'd say that half or more of the park is left in its natural state, akin to the Wissahickon Park here in Philadelphia. That's a different kind of park experience entirely. it has its attractions as well (I enjoyed hiking one of the principal trails in Wissahickon Park, for instance), but it's more "outdoorsy" than "recreational" or "cultural".

Olmsted sculpted nature to look better than it does. Kessler worked in that tradition as well (consider Hyde Park; the park bearing his name, nee North Terrace Park, isn't what I'd call sculpted, but of course, human hands produced Cliff Drive, the only urban scenic byway in Missouri). Swope left it alone for the most part.

Come to think of it, most Kansas City parks aren't all that sculpted because many of them preserve the natural terrain (Penn Valley Park, for instance). Loose Park, which was the former site of the Kansas City Country Club (the country club that gave its name to both the Plaza and the residential district J.C. Nichols built around it), may be as close as KC gets to a Forest Park-style park.

[Hazel W]

Originally Posted by MarketStEl

I would say that Forest Park, which is the primary legacy the Louisiana Purchase Exposition of 1904 left to the City of St. Louis, is more a sculpted environment with plenty of other amenities (e.g., St. Louis Museum of Art) in it — a Frederick Law Olmsted-style park even though I don't believe Olmsted had anything to do with its design.

Kansas City's park and boulevard network began as the work of George Kessler, but I don't believe Kessler had anything to do with sculpting Swope Park. I may be wrong about the part of the park the city annexed when Col. Swope donated it to the city in 1896, but I'd say that half or more of the park is left in its natural state, akin to the Wissahickon Park here in Philadelphia. That's a different kind of park experience entirely. it has its attractions as well (I enjoyed hiking one of the principal trails in Wissahickon Park, for instance), but it's more "outdoorsy" than "recreational" or "cultural".

Olmsted sculpted nature to look better than it does. Kessler worked in that tradition as well (consider Hyde Park; the park bearing his name, nee North Terrace Park, isn't what I'd call sculpted, but of course, human hands produced Cliff Drive, the only urban scenic byway in Missouri). Swope left it alone for the most part.

Come to think of it, most Kansas City parks aren't all that sculpted because many of them preserve the natural terrain (Penn Valley Park, for instance). Loose Park, which was the former site of the Kansas City Country Club (the country club that gave its name to both the Plaza and the residential district J.C. Nichols built around it), may be as close as KC gets to a Forest Park-style park.

I did write a reply to this but it seems to have disappeared. Just said that the Art Museum building was also part of that legacy. At least the original building was. The addition was just a few years ago. Different architectural style. I guess it suits its times - modern- but hey do not look right to me tied together. Everyone has his own tastes.

[westender]

Originally Posted by Hazel W

I did write a reply to this but it seems to have disappeared. Just said that the Art Museum building was also part of that legacy. At least the original building was. The addition was just a few years ago. Different architectural style. I guess it suits its times - modern- but hey do not look right to me tied together. Everyone has his own tastes.

The Nelson-Atkins Museum in KC was built in the early 1930s, and although still Beaux-Arts in general form, it has a lot of modernist elements, Architectural Modernism had really come into its own by The Depression.

[MarketStEl]

Originally Posted by westender

The Nelson-Atkins Museum in KC was built in the early 1930s, and although still Beaux-Arts in general form, it has a lot of modernist elements, Architectural Modernism had really come into its own by The Depression.

True, but the Henry Bloch Wing is a completely different animal. It did, however, put to use the grand staircase on the original building's east side, which for some reason was designed to serve as a main entrance (the building's cornerstone is at the base of the east doors). Since it doesn't lead directly into Kirkwood Hall, the grand central court, the location of this entrance puzzled me as a kid.

However, that entrance is also the one that honors Mary Atkins, whose role in endowing the museum (and her name) got slighted for many decades.

[Hazel W]

Originally Posted by westender

The Nelson-Atkins Museum in KC was built in the early 1930s, and although still Beaux-Arts in general form, it has a lot of modernist elements, Architectural Modernism had really come into its own by The Depression.

Thank you. Does it still have the (swans?) out in front? A lot of people complained about those but I thought it looked very nice It added a bright spirit to the scene. It really is a lovely museum. My favorite, to be honest.

[westender]

The building has imperial-sized, bronze urns flanking both entrances. There is a reflecting pool on the north side, but I have never seen swans there. It was a parking lot for many years. There is also Brush Creek about 200 yards down the hill on the southern side. But again, no swans.

On both lawns, Claes Oldenburg placed enormous shuttlecocks in the 1990s, and as an upthread post described, Henry Bloch's post-modernist extension (by architect Steven Holl) snakes down the hill along the eastern boundary. Before the Oldenburgs, the lawn hosted a collection of abstract sculptures by Henry Moore given by Donald in honor of his father Joyce Hall, another local luminary family. Before THAT -- so going back into the 1970s and earlier, the south grounds were used for temporary installations of modern art -- so there may have been some bronze swans back then.

The central hall was kept more or less in stasis from the 1930s until recently. Julian Z, the current head of museum, has moved things around and kept everyone on their toes. A good thing IMHO but endlessly frustrating to old-timers (like my Dad) who expect the same pieces in the same places as they were before WW2.

The Nelson-Atkins also owns Kirkwood Hall, a former tennis club, across the road (Rockhill Road) -- these names are all intertwined with the long-ago ownership of the local newspaper, the Star (William Rockhill Nelson, Laura Nelson Kirkwood). Those grounds may become more sculpture gardens in the future, and I suspect a passage, either over the road or underneath, will connect the grounds at some point.