Harris Armstrong Collection, 1924-1972 | WUA University Archives

This collection is divided into twelve (12) series as follows:

Series 1: Personal and Professional Development (arranged alphabetically)

Series 2: Publications Featuring Prominent Architects and Contemporary Architectural Subjects (arranged alphabetically)

Series 3: Specifications and Correspondence for Commercial Architectural Projects (arranged alphabetically)

Series 4: Specifications and Correspondence for Residential Architectural Projects (arranged alphabetically)

Series 5: Oversized Plans for Commercial Architectural Projects (arranged alphabetically)

Series 6: Oversized Plans for Residential Architectural Projects (arranged alphabetically)

Series 7: Oversized Plans for Residential Furnishing Projects (arranged alphabetically by project name)

Series 8: Oversized Renderings, Photographs, and Miscellany for Unidentified Architectural Projects (arranged by size)

Series 9: Oversized Renderings, Photographs, and Miscellany for Various Architectural Projects (arranged by size)

Series 10: Oversized Education, Professional Qualifications, and Miscellany

Series 11: Supplemental Information for Commercial and Architectural Projects (includes photographs and documents) (arranged alphabetically)

Series 12: Photographs of Various Projects (arranged by size, then alphabetically) This series includes photographs from at least one exhibit of Armstrong’s work, “Midwest Modern”, based on the label on the back of most photographs.  See the text explaining this exhibit in Box 4.  Posters from another exhibit are also included in Box 4, which may have included these photographs.

When given, project numbers generally indicate that a contract was signed, bids secured, and the project completed.  Armstrong assigned the year and project order. For example 57-6 would indicate the initial planning was in 1957 and was the sixth project of that year.

Harris Armstrong (April 6, 1899 – December 15, 1973) was a well-read and largely self-taught modern architect revered for his masterful application of strikingly colorful, innovative, and spacious structures for every use conceivable.  Especially popular in America's Middle West from the 1930's to 1960's, Armstrong's favored designs quietly echoed the Scandinavian and Asian tendency of observing economic resourcefulness of material and elegant simplicity of form, coupled with his self-defined brash interpretation of Frank Lloyd Wright's work.

After serving in the United States Army Air Corps as a private during the First World War, Armstrong studied architecture at both Ohio State University and Washington University, though he never graduated from either institution.   From 1924 to the early 1930's Armstrong served as a draftsman in several firms in New York and St. Louis.  It was when Armstrong worked as a landscape gardener during the Depression that his novel architectural vision of combining flavorful interior and exterior design elements began to mature. In the mid 1930's, Armstrong formally started his own practice in Kirkwood, Missouri.

Highly sought after for his daring designs and known for his flamboyant and engaging disposition, Armstrong was equally successful in procuring scores of residential and commercial contracts.  In St. Louis, some of his residential clients included Doctors Carl and Gerty Cori (Nobel Peace Prize recipients) and Dr. Henry Hampton.  His notable commercial projects and clients in St. Louis included Washington University, McDonnell Aircraft Corporation, American Stove Company, Scruggs-Vandervoort-Barney, the St. Louis Ethical Society, the Kirkwood Community Center, the Lutheran Church of the Atonement, and various Y.W.C.A. branches.  Additionally, Armstrong was the only solo-finalist in the design competition for the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial in St. Louis.