Whether you like them or not, Ralph Rapson’s buildings have something to say.

Just look at Riverside Plaza, the modernist apartment complex that defines the West Bank horizon. Unlike the luxury apartments that pop up around campus, Riverside’s concrete towers and multicolored panels are impossible to overlook.

“There was something very unapologetic about his outlook on what he designed, and he really truly stood behind it,” said Olivia Copia, a processing and preservation assistant at the University of Minnesota’s Northwest Architectural Archives (NAA). “He was such a huge influence on a forward way of thinking. His buildings feel like they were ahead of his time.”

Rapson passed away in 2008, but his modernist designs still shape today’s neighborhoods and skylines. And the work he left behind – his architectural drawings, correspondence, photography, teaching materials, and more – will soon be available in the NAA.

The NAA collects the records of architects and designers from the Midwest, but whose works extend beyond the boundaries of the United States. Rapson is a premier figure in the modernist movement, and Project Archivist Teresa Tjepkes hopes the Ralph Rapson Papers will inspire researchers, historians, and future architects.

“​​Rapson was one of Minnesota’s architectural greats, both for his contribution to modern design and for his dedication to supporting the next generation of architects. Having his papers available for research really strengthens our archives,” Tjepkes said.

But above all, Tjepkes wants to give the current residents of Rapson’s buildings an avenue into their history, a way to learn about who came before and who might come after.

“That connection to the local community means a lot to me,” Tjepkes said.

Daring with design

Rapson, of Alma, Michigan, studied architecture at the University of Michigan and the Cranbrook Academy of Art, and as a student, faced friction for his style and designs.

Rapson’s right arm was amputated shortly after birth, so he learned to draw with his left hand. But his looser style of sketching didn’t conform to the clean lines of traditional architectural drawings. He was a prolific sketch artist, drawing quickly and proficiently.

Rapson’s ideas were so unusual for the time, Copia said, that he became more “daring with design.”

“He was working on his drawings up until the day before he died. It was not just his career, it was his passion and his lifestyle as well,” Copia said.

Rapson’s illustrations went beyond function and were at times whimsical. He always sketched with people in mind, families and kids and theater-goes in elaborate outfits populate his pages.

Rapson’s diamond-shaped treehouse study is an emblematic example. Rapson sketched it for a local magazine’s call for submissions for treehouse designs, though ultimately he never submitted it.

The study includes standard-fare elements, like the building’s dimensions. But Rapson also drew little human figures playing in the branches, hanging on a tire swing, and lounging inside the house. These small details aren’t common in other architectural collections.

“There’s been these little annotations too in some of the drawings, some little sassy comments that you aren’t expecting,” Copia added. “There’s been these little pieces of personality that have shown through in what’s usually very businessy, very serious.”

Tjepkes and Copia are digitizing over 400 drawings from Rapson’s architectural firm, which should debut online by the end of the summer.

“Rapson was very fond of sketching on tracing paper … You really get to see the span of his design process,” Tjepkes said. “Another interesting point of research would be to track how his thoughts about the design evolved over time.”

Modern in every sense

After college, Rapson worked for the Saarinen architectural office and taught architecture at the New Bauhaus School (now IIT Institute of Design) and later the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 1954, he moved to the Twin Cities, where he served as the dean of the College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture for the next 30 years.

Susan Hegland Blumentals, a local architect who graduated in 1959, credits Rapson with allowing women back into the U’s program. Under his leadership, the college also hired women to work in their offices while they were students.

“[Rapson] re-formed the school into a forward-looking, profession-oriented, and inclusive experience for all,” Blumentals said. “I, for one, would not be in architecture today if the leadership had not changed.”

Rapson was a modernist architect, a school of thought that believes “form follows function,” Tjepkes said. Modernist buildings are often minimalist, lack excessive ornamentation, and emphasize modern materials. Rapson’s buildings, for example, used primarily concrete and glass to construct large open-floor plans.

“He paid a lot of attention to how light filled a room and geometric structures,” Tjepkes said.

Locally, Rapson is most well-known as the architect of the original Guthrie Theater, built in 1963, adjacent to the Walker Art Center. It’s Tjepkes’ favorite Rapson building.

“With this exterior screen, it made it so unique, not like any other building I’ve seen in the Twin Cities,” Tjepkes said.

Rapson’s relationship with Tyrone Guthrie, the theater’s founder and artistic director, was “contentious” at times. The design and arrangement of seating was an issue. They both wanted the theater to feel intimate and agreed that no seat should be further than 45 feet away from the stage.

But what color should the chairs be? Rapson wanted a confetti design with 10 bright colors sprinkled throughout the auditorium. Guthrie refused, instead favoring neutral tones, so as not to distract from the performance.

Rapson ordered the colored chairs anyway, and they arrived a few days before the theater’s grand opening, when it was too late to change anything.

Privately, Rapson had a nickname for Tyrone Guthrie, “Sir Tyrant,” but “he always maintained a sense of fun and professionalism,” Tjepkes said.

In his drawings for the theater’s seating layout, Rapson included fabric swatches, an unusual inclusion in these types of files, she explained. And since its demolition in 2006, these samples are some of the few remaining pieces of the original theater.

People-centered design

Rapson also designed Riverside Plaza in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood, then called Cedar Square West. Rapson had a “utopian” vision for the apartment complex, Tjepkes said.

He wanted to have subsidized housing and market housing under the same roof, but federal guidelines mandated separating buildings for each. It was originally part one of a five-stage project, cut short when funding from the Department of Housing and Urban Development ran dry.

It was also meant to have a large central meeting space, where residents and other community members could meet and interact.

“It was clearly intended as a space that was supposed to foster community and togetherness with the residents,” Copia said.

“I’m really hoping with this collection, we can invite the current community, which is largely an immigrant community, to come in and share their experiences with the buildings, as we share more of the history around them,” Tjepkes added.

Rapson’s other buildings include the Rarig Center on the U of M’s West Bank, the Arvonne Fraser Library on East Bank, the St. Peter’s Lutheran Church in Edina, the St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church in St. Paul, and the United States Embassies in Sweden and Denmark.

He also designed several residential homes. Copia’s personal favorite is “Longshadows,” also known as the Mrs. Edward Brooks residence. Brooks challenged Rapson to venture beyond his typical style and incorporate elements of Japanese architecture. So the house uses pagoda lines for the roof.

“There’s something really special about the houses in particular,” Copia said.

A paper trail stretching back 54 years

The Ralph Rapson Papers comprise around 300 cubic feet of his materials — roughly the size of a small studio apartment, or 300 basketballs stacked together.

It features a mix of materials from his time at the university as well as from his private practice, Rapson Architects, where he worked from 1954 until his death in 2008. The collection includes his architectural drawings, job files, and teaching materials.

There’s also over 23,000 slides of photography from his travels and architectural studies. Like with his designs, Rapson had an eye for light, shadow, and composition in his photography, Copia said.

“He has a very large collection of studies that he did in Minnesota, including one titled, ‘Ugliness,’ which was just urban sprawl,” she said. “One of the things I’ve enjoyed the most is just seeing the world through his eyes and what inspired him and what inspired his buildings.”

The team is hoping to produce a series of interviews with Rapson’s son. Toby Rapson is an architect like his father and joined the family firm in 1979. He’s currently the CEO and owner of Rapson Architects.

Toby provided more context and clarity to the materials for Tjepkes and Copia, and helped them organize the collection to make it more accessible to researchers and the public.

“He really loves to tell stories about his time and his experiences with the collections,” Copia said. “He’s been so amazingly helpful, but also just really fun to work with.”

Once the collection is finalized, they’re planning an exhibition or presentation to showcase the lasting impact Rapson had on the architectural world. It’s clear from his letters, Copia said, just how much he influenced his peers and students.

“There’s some students who have sent correspondence later in life about how much he impacted them as a teacher and as a famous architect in their life,” Copia said. “Getting to learn more about him has been such a rewarding part of this process.”