Explore the register

Explore Modern features a fresh, authentic, and comprehensive catalogue of our nation’s historic modern sites layering scholarly research with user-sourced information, maps and plans as well as historic and user-submitted photos.

Building on the legacy of the decade-serving Docomomo US Register, the Explore Modern project seeks to:

  • Offer a robust educational research tool
  • Raise awareness and enrich the understanding of the unique aspects of this design legacy
  • Inspire action for National Register of Historic Places, National Historic Landmark designation or local landmark listing
  • Inform stewardship decisions of property owners, facilities personnel and caretakers
  • Encourage user to submit building listings, information and images

Featured Sites

Burroughs-Wellcome Building

A dynamic and expressive design was created for this administrative headquarters. Rhythm and space are achieved through the use of strong external forms arranged in a contemporary "ziggurat fashion." Lighting within the interior spaces effectively adds to the building's design. The interaction of bold forms with the rolling hillside is intriguing as well as harmonious. The building is one of its kind in the nation. Adapted from A Field Guide to Landmarks of Modern Architecture in the United States by Miriam F. Stimpson

Featured Sites

Johnson Publishing Company

The 11-story Johnson Publishing Company Building at 820 S. Michigan Avenue was built for John H. Johnson, owner of one of the largest black-owned businesses in the country. Architect John Moutoussamy designed the building, which was completed in 1971. The building served as offices for a number of Johnson publications, including Ebony and Jet magazines, and it had exuberant interiors designed by Palm Springs-based Arthur Elrod and William Raiser. A 1972 special edition of Ebony magazine was dedicated entirely to the new building and included numerous photos of the building’s vibrant, sometimes even psychedelic, interiors.

The Johnson Publishing Building is the only high-rise building in downtown Chicago designed by an African American architect. The building was designated as a Chicago Landmark in 2017 and was converted to residential use in 2018. Before the building’s conversion, the iconic Ebony Magazine test kitchen was removed from the building and is now in the collection of the New York-based Museum of Food and Drink. The Johnson Publishing Building retains its iconic “Ebony / Jet” rooftop sign overlooking Michigan Avene.

Featured Sites

Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture

A division of the New York Public Library, The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem is one of the world’s leading cultural institutions devoted to the research, preservation, and exhibition of materials focused on African American, African Diaspora, and African experiences. 

Originally established within the 135th Street Branch of the NY Public Library (1905), a Carnegie library designed by McKim, Mead & White, the Schomburg Center was greatly expanded with the construction of an adjacent new Modern building designed by J. Max Bond, Jr. of Bond Ryder Associates, completed in 1980. 

During a period when the project had been temporarily cancelled due to lack of funds, Ada Louise Huxtable wrote “Bond, Ryder came up with a very good scheme. First, they had changed the program they were given from a large demolition and rebuilding project to something far more sensitive and sensible by calculating the future maintenance and staffing cost for what would have been an overambitious museum and library combination. They cut down the museum space and suggested that the McKim, Mead and White building be saved and recycled for the art and artifacts displays.” Huxtable concluded, “It is a simple, rational design, rich in neighborhood amenity, at once economical and potentially elegant.”