IL_Chicago--Dutch Grill Room, New Morrison Hotel

PPC of the Dutch Grill Room. The faience murals described below are in the background.

DUTCH GRILL ROOM, NEW MORRISON HOTEL--CHICAGO, IL

Lost

Title of Installation:

Dutch Grill Room in the New Morrison Hotel

Materials Used:

Ceramic tiles

General Description:

"...the guest who happens into the new structure...is 'struck by tile' in the most beautiful forms of tile-topped tables, tile-faced columns, tiled panels, floors, bathrooms, kitchen, bakery, service bars, ice boxes and even the dance-hall floor... ."¹

"When the hostilities developed in Europe [World War I] the tiling intended for use in the New Morrison Hotel had been on order from Holland and Germany... . ...[The owners had no] possibility of receiving the most important part of its decoration from abroad. ...Two [U.S. tile manufacturers] were eventually found... ."²

"The first object to meet the eye in the dining-room is a large mural decoration of a scene near Antwerp, in blue and white tile, depicting a family of Hollanders in the fields on the shores of the ocean with a sail-boat, clouds, windmill and farmhouses in the distance. ...The grill room...wall design is completed with small panels of blue and white satin finished faience tile which depict cubist scenes in the peaceable land of windmills... . The same color scheme is to be found in the mat finish flint tiling six inches by six inches which is used in the construction of the entire floor. ...The bases of the English oak pillars are...molded Ohio flint tile...and are entirely in white."³

"An innovation will be found in the dancing hall where the floor is constructed of Bismarck pattern black and white, eighteen by eighteen tile... ."⁴

Technical Information (Size, tile company, etc.):

"The tile ordered from Holland and Germany has been successfully reproduced and improved upon by American makers in Zanesville and Cincinnati, Ohio."⁵

The "Ohio flint tile" mentioned above is one brand name used by the American Encaustic Tiling Company of Zanesville, OH. There were two major tile companies operating in Cincinnati at this time, either of which could have produced tiles for this grill room--the Rookwood Pottery and the Wheatley Pottery & Tile Company. Rookwood is the more probable maker, however, as its product included Dutch-motif tiles for at least one other restaurant in Cincinnati at a later date (https://sites.google.com/site/tileinstallationdatabasemz/oh_cincinnati--mills-restaurant).

Year Created:

1914

Year Installed, if different:

Does Installation Still Exist?

No

If Not, What Happened?

Unknown

Location of Installation:

GPS Coordinates:

Additional Information, Websites, Citations:

^1,2,3,4,5"American Tilemakers Excel Foreign Producers", Brick and Clay Record, Vol. XLVI, No. 6, March 16, 1915, pp. 561-562.

Any additional close-up photographs of these tile murals would be appreciated.

Submitted by and Year:

Submitted by Michael Padwee (tileback101'at'collector.org) in April 2012.