Some Rudolph-ian items, recently on display at the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation. At the top-center is a print of a drawing by Paul Rudolph, showing his intentions for the structure and detail of a portion of the Deane Residence (built in Great Neck, NY). That drawing, as well as the Rudolph’s drawings for the Yale Art & Architecture Building (that are also shown here) were generously donated by R.D. Chin. Other items in this view (on the far right) are two faxes which Rudolph sent from Jakarta to the staff of his New York office (while he was traveling overseas to work with clients). In those faxes, he’d address various staff members, giving each instructions about the various projects they were working on.—and occasionally theses faxes would include small architectural diagrams. [It is worth noting that these were sent when faxing was the high-tech communications technology of its time: before e-mail, faxing was the fastest and most efficient way that businesses could use to send written and graphic information.]
A few months ago, RD Chin—an architect who had worked closely with Paul Rudolph—gave us a group of significant items to add to the archives of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation. We showed that in a recent post—but now we want to extend our acknowledgement of Mr. Chin for a further act of generosity. He surprised us with the gift of additional Rudolph materials for our archives: drawings (renderings and construction documents), photographs, brochures, exhibit catalogs, and books.
Another view of our display of Rudolph materials—including some of the recent gifts from R.D. Chin. Among the examples is a high-resolution print of a rendering of the interior of Paul Rudolph’s Burroughs Wellcome headquarters (built in Durham, North Carolina), at the upper-left. Other recent gifts include a Rudolph rendering of the Dharmala Headquarters (built in Jakarta) at the top-center; and the plan of the Edersheim Pool House (bottom center). Other Rudolph documents, from the archives of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation, are shown here: a vintage brochure for the Temple Street Parking Garage (featuring a Rudolph rendering) built in New Haven (shown at far-left); and an offprint of an extensive article on the Bond Center (built in Hong Kong) from a magazine for the Italian concrete industry (shown at bottom-left).
We are very grateful to RD Chin for adding these Rudolph “treasures”—the ones shown here, and many more—to the archives of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation. The donation of materials like these help us move forward with several of our missions, including supporting the study of Paul Rudolph’s work and the preservation of his legacy. Each of the items is being cataloged and added into our database of Rudolph works.
NOTE: If any readers—including former employees or clients of Rudolph—would like to donate papers, drawings, documents, or memorabilia to the archive, we would like to talk to you! Not only may you qualify for a tax deduction for the value of the material, but we’d also like to show it off here on our blog. To learn more, contact us at: office@paulrudolphheritagefoundation.org
RD Chin, shown while working in Paul Rudolph’s office in New York, next to a model of the Concourse (built in Singapore). Just peeking out at the bottom of the photo, below the tabletop, is the top of one of the fork-shapedmetal drawing-board supports which Rudolph had designed and custom fabricated for his offices—they can be seen in photos of his New Haven studio, and they seem to have move with him to his subsequent office locations (as well as showing up in Rudolph’s perspective rendering of his New York office).
We also want to share a bit about R.D. Chin—architect and feng shui consultant:
R.D. Chin, Feng Shui Architect has a civil engineering degree (BSCE) from Tufts University and a masters degree in architecture (M.Arch) from the University of Pennsylvania.
Mr. Chin had the privilege and honor to work with the late master architect, Paul Rudolph; he worked three periods in Rudolph’s office: 1981-1983, 1985-1989, and 1990-1996 — beginning as an apprentice to becoming his office manager.
His feng shui training was under the tutelage of the late Grandmaster Lin Yun, Howard Choy, Master Raymond Lo, and other feng shui teachers. He also does residential and commercial consultations and performs blessing ceremonies. In addition, RD hosts a creative salon series where he shares his experiences of qigong and other meditative practices.
He has worked on proposals for an urban planning and housing development in the Netherlands, a Feng Shui Proposal for the World Trade Center Memorial Competition, and his projects include the corporate headquarters for Felippo Berio Olive Oil, NJ; Standard Chartered Bank; and an affordable housing project for One Flushing, NY.
He is author of Feng Shui Revealed, published by Clarkson Potter of Random House.
Contact information—
rdchin53@gmail.com
(917)669-8099