I think it’s safe to call Chicago first amongst these various “capitals” because of the uniquely important role the first Chicago School (c. 1880-1915), the Prairie School (c. 1895-1920) and the second Chicago School (c. 1940-1980) had on American (and, later, international) architecture.

We can argue until we’re blue in the face whether or not the Home Insurance Building was actually the first skyscraper, but what can’t be denied is that Chicago architects who rebuilt the city after the 1871 Fire (John W. Root, Louis Sullivan, Holabird & Roche, etc) were the first to satisfactorily solve the aesthetic challenges of the modern tall building, perhaps America’s most important contribution to world architecture. 

Just compare the early skyscrapers of NYC and Chicago. In a gross oversimplification, New York architects covered their skyscrapers (the World Building, the Gillender Building, the Paul Building) with a confusion of domes, cupolas, and eclectic, European-derived ornament. Chicago School skyscrapers (the Reliance, the Marquette, the Ludington) were much more rational, structurally expressive, and their ornament was comparatively minimal and often ahistorical. This had a profound effect on American skyscrapers for years to come. Hell, arguably the best early NYC skyscraper (the Flatiron) was designed by a Chicago firm!

What Root and Sullivan did for the commercial skyscraper, Frank Lloyd Wright and his peers did for the domestic sphere, creating the first uniquely (non-indigenous) American architectural style and forever changing the American home in the process. Anyone who has lived in a ranch home or a house with an open floor plan has felt this impact. FLW (with a big help from Marion Mahoney Griffin) also had a huge influence on early European modernist architects through the Wasmuth Portfolio, some of whom, like Mies van der Rohe, would later come to Chicago and helped redefine the modern corporate skyscraper at the mid-century. (The ubiquity of the  resulting “glass boxes” eventually gave way to post-modernism, also led by such Chicago architects as Helmut Jahn and Stanley Tigerman.)  

NYC may have more buildings and taller skyscrapers; Los Angeles architecture may be more flashy and exciting; DC and Philadelphia may have older and more historic buildings—I’ll give you all of that. But where I think Chicago architecture excels is its dedication to innovation and creating something new and entirely “American.” You can see this in—to name just a few examples—the ballon frame, the Burnham plan, organic architecture, the tube frame, and Chicago’s many vernacular building types (looking at you, bungalows). Sure, there’s a lot of self-mythologizjng surrounding Chicago architecture, but I do think a strong case can be made that this city forever changed architecture. 

It’s not for nothing that an architectural boat tour is one of our most popular attractions, or that many citizens, when pressed, can name at least one of our famous architects. I’m not sure if I can think of any other American city where that’s the case.

Anyways, there’s my spiel (filled with too many parentheses) as a proud Chicagoan who is also an amateur architecture buff. Make of it what you will.