Society of Beaux-Arts Architects

The Beaux-Arts Institute of Design (BAID) was an art and architectural school at 304 East 44th Street in Turtle Bay, Manhattan, in New York City. It was founded in 1916 by Lloyd Warren for the training of American architects, sculptors and mural painters consistent with the educational agenda of the French École des Beaux-Arts.

According to John Harbeson, these values included:

Also fundamental to Ecole teaching was coordination among architects, sculptors and muralists to create integrated architectural experiences.

As of 2008 the building, built in 1928, now houses the Permanent Mission of the Arab Republic of Egypt to the United Nations.

BAID grew out of the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects, a formal club of American architects who had attended the Parisian school.

From its beginning in 1894, the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects had been interested in improving architectural education in the U.S.. It took on the task of developing standard architectural "programmes" for design problems to be given as assignments in architecture schools and in independent ateliers. The intent was to raise performance standards, but the effect also was to standardize the way architecture was taught all across the United States. By 1900, most American architecture schools and many independent ateliers were participating. By 1916 the burden of providing problem statements and jurying the work from an increasing number of schools and ateliers exceeded the capacity of the Society, so it established BAID to carry on this work.

Among sculpture professionals, the foundation of BAID ensured a supply of competent decorative sculptors, and allowed the members of the National Sculpture Society to position themselves as fine artists in comparison.

The National Sculpture Society deeded over a building at 126 East 75th Street to the newly created BAID. Courses began on September 18, 1916 in three departments. The architecture department was associated with a committee from the Society; the sculpture department with a committee from the National Sculpture Society; and the mural department with a committee from the Society of Mural Painters.

Architect Frederic Charles Hirons of Dennison & Hirons was central to the founding and running of the school. Hirons had attended the Paris school from 1904 through 1909; co-founded BAID in 1916; designed the BAID building in 1928 (won through a competition, in the manner of Beaux-Arts); and served as president of the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects from 1937 through 1939.

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