Episode 135: Mary Rockwell Hook
Mary was a trailblazing architect who shook up residential design when few women were even allowed in the field. After studying at Wellesley, the Art Institute of Chicago, and spending time in Paris, she came back to Kansas City and started designing houses that broke the rules—homes that hugged steep hillsides, opened up to light and air, and often included things nobody else was doing yet, like attached garages, concrete foundations, and even swimming pools. She loved using salvaged materials and had a knack for blending European and Mediterranean styles with a very practical sense of how people actually live. Some of her best-known projects include the Pink House and Floyd Jacobs House in Kansas City, plus her big master plan for Pine Mountain Settlement School in Kentucky. Later in life, she moved to Florida, where she created whole communities like Whispering Sands and Sandy Hook and kept experimenting with new ideas like solar heating. Even though she was shut out of the AIA for most of her career because she was a woman, she finally got recognition at age 100. Today, she’s remembered as one of Kansas City’s most creative architects and a designer way ahead of her time.
Caryatid: Chandra Moore
Chandra is an architect and developer who founded coG Studio in 2011 after leaving corporate practice. Drawing on her global experience with large-scale projects, she now leads a firm that designs everything from luxury homes and multi-family housing to retail, offices, and community hubs—completing over 845 housing units nationwide with a focus on people-first design and community engagement.
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This transcript was prepared during the development of the episode.
Final recorded episode may deviate slightly from the content presented below as changes, edits, or improvements may be made during the recording and editing process.
Jessica: Hi! Welcome to season 13 of She Builds Podcast, where we share stories about women in the design and construction field, one lady at a time.
Lizi: This season's theme is: “All Things Home” . We are talking about ladies who were involved in residential projects.
Norgerie: As always, we are not experts, we are just sharing stories about the information that we find, as friends having a fun conversation. If you find an error, send us an email and we will all continue learning.
Jessica: This week we will be talking about Mary Rockwell Hook, a pioneer residential architect in the Midwest. I’m Jessica Rogers, celebrating Labor Day weekend by going to the beach and giving a shout out to my Papa and Beyoncé on their birthday, my two favorite people share a birthday hahahah and I’m based out of Miami, Florida.
Norgerie: Your two favorite people share a birthday? Does that mean your mom and sister are fighting for third place?
Jessica: there is no first place or second lol I don’t rank my favorite people like MySpace lol but my favorite people tend to share birthdays - other fun fact my sister’s birthday is the same day as baby girl Miriam, friend to the show Stacey’s daughter.
Norgerie: hahah, I’m Norgerie Rivas teasing Jessica in Houston Texas.
Lizi: And I’m Lizi Raar, laughing in San Francisco. I share a birthday with Miriam’s brother Diego. Birthday buds.
Jessica: you seee - my favorite people, okay before we begin I would like to give a shout out to a listener because this was a listener suggestion episode?!!
Lizi: Wooo!
Norgerie: Awesome!
Jessica: See folks think we don’t look at your messages but we do and my favorite is when we get messages with listener suggestions AND THEN it just so happens that you have an episode due that week and you haven’t decided who you do a story on but then you read this message and her work just happens to align with the season that you are working ughhh I love it when the universe works in your favor and you have amazing listeners to help even though they might not know that they are helping in more ways than one
Lizi: hahaha the stars aligning.
Jessica: so should out Jenny W. Who reached out to us via Facebook Messenger - (Facebook is still poppin I don’t know Millennials are sleeping on it) Jenny found our show when she was driving from Utah to Kentucky after a national park trip and she wanted to learn about Mary Coulter, ep. 33 and now we are going to talk about one of Jenny's faves, another Mary.
Norgerie: That's so cool! I saw that message come in, she made my day. Thank you Jenny, Hope you enjoyed today's episode. Jessica did you reach out to Jenny saying you were doing this episode? She may be able to give us more insight, possibly a charrette?
Jessica: I told her that we would include her on our list of episodes. By the time of this recording I hadn’t reached out but I’m hoping to have updates in our wrap up. Okay so let’s get the party started - we begin in Junction City, Kansas. Mary Rockwell was born on September 8th, 1877. Her father was Bertrand Rockwell, a wealthy grain merchant and her mother’s name was Julia. I’m not sure what her mother did but Mary would be the third out of five daughters. I’m also thinking they were of high society ish if the dad was a wealthy grain merchant.
Lizi: It sounds like it if he’s described as wealthy. Sounds like they were doin’ alright.
Norgerie: Yep.
Jessica: Mary would attend Dana Hall Prep school and later attend Wellesley College, graduating in 1900.
Lizi: Well we’ve mentioned Wellesley before on previous episodes. It is an all women’s college in Massachusetts, it was founded in 1870 and was a leading college for women and was an early pioneer in science studies for women.
Jessica: So not much is said about her schoolin’s just yet right? I get the idea that she was probably just going with the motions of what life was: parties, debutantes, college, but she also travelled. Her family was very adamant on education and travel. In 1902, Mary would return to the states after a trip to the Philippines.
Norgerie: The Philippines? That's interesting. Usually our ladies go to Europe. Lizi wants to go to the Philippines. Fun fact.
Lizi: I really do. Heard great things about it and it looks beautiful. But yeah I love that she was branching out from the usual Europe trips.
Jessica: The trip proved to be transformative because after that trip, she decided to pursue architecture. So in 1903, Mary would enroll at the Art Institute of Chicago to study architecture.
Lizi: Interesting. I wonder what about her travels inspired that.
Norgerie: Oh now I wanna look up pre 1900s Filipino architecture.
Jessica: of course she was the only woman in her class in fact she was the first woman to enroll in their architecture program. It came up during my research that she experienced some discrimination but I couldn’t find what exactly but after 100 plus episodes we can imagine what went down
Lizi: Trailblazer being the first woman! Sadly I am not surprised she experienced discrimination. Like you said, we’ve heard tons of stories from our ladies of ridiculous comments and expectations on women at this time who were trying to get a degree and break into this male dominated profession.
Norgerie: sure, they dock points on their tests, they tell them their lost home economics class is on the other side of school, they flat out don't let them in university, or they let them in but they don't give them a degree… We can go on and on.
Jessica: But like our ladies, resilience is in their DNA - and remember Mary was the travel queen - in 1905 Mary would travel to Paris to work at Jacques Marcel Auburtin’s Atelier
Norgerie: We made it to Europe. Jacques was a prominent dude, he was also known as Jean-Marcel, he was a French Architect who became famous for his work in Urban Planning, specially reconstruction of destroyed cities, but we're not there yet.
Jessica: Working for Marcel was all just a waiting period for her while she waited to attend the École de Beaux-Arts
Lizi: oooooo love that she is going for the Ecole, following in Julia’s footsteps.
Norgerie: Gotta practice her French and the metric system.
Jessica: but she ended up not getting accepted but get this! so here she also experienced discrimination and harassment. I found a story that after Mary took the entrance exam the male candidates were waiting for her to leave to throw buckets of water at her. Not sure if she got wet but home girl ran, caught a taxi and fled. So like I mentioned she didn’t get accepted, didn’t pass the entrance exam, and decided not to try again.
Lizi: WHAA!?! Buckets of water!?! Ugh. That’s awful. And by this time it’s not like other women hadn’t gotten in so why do we need to be so rude still? Very sad that she didn’t get in and was essentially run off from the school.
Norgerie: I wish I could press charges against these people. I hope they either led unhappy lives or at some point came to regret their actions and fought for women's rights.
Jessica: But listen okay Miss Mary queen of travel was like “I will explore French Architecture on my own, we will do bicycle trips with my sister.”
Lizi: CUTE! But yes, forge your own path Mary!
Norgerie: Yeah! It's the early 1900s you don't need a diploma to be an architect look at Frank, nobody was throwing water buckets at him.
Jessica: I love mentioning Mary’s travels because a lot of sources say that her travels would later influence her work. What I like about hearing some of her experiences is that it reminds me of us and how we travel, and just the idea of experiencing new places and new cultures.
Lizi: Yes, we have always loved exploring and seeing new cultures and architecture around the world. Mary is a kindred spirit.
Norgerie: It's been a while since all three of us visited a new country together, we should fix that.
Lizi: Tell me when and where.
Jessica: You know I stay passport and global entry ready. Well, a source was saying that they believe that this informal training “contributed to her characteristic warmth that her work exudes; a more formal education may very well have stifled her talent.”
Norgerie: Ahh, it was meant to be this way.
Lizi: That’s an interesting observation. I can see the argument for that, that she was taught in a more experiential way than academic and so for her she learned by how the spaces felt. So that would definitely translate into her work.
Jessica: So in 1906, Mary was back in the states, her family decided to move from junction city to Kansas City. And Mary gets to work, okay! She briefly works at a firm called Howe, Hoit and Cutler designing bungalows and other homes.
Norgerie: Get it Mary!
Lizi: Love it, she’s getting down to business and dipping her toe in the professional waters.
Jessica: All with her father’s support - 1908, Mary designs 3 houses, which get built! There was one in California for one of her sisters, she designed her own, and then there was the one that she did for her parents.
Lizi: A family affair. Also fun that she got to do one house in a different state and have some variety in context and location.
Norgerie: True, true.
Jessica: And then her career kinda took off, she was known for designing houses on steep, sloping lots, where she would incorporate the natural terrain.
Norgerie: Talk about a niche market!
Lizi: ooooo hillside lots. That is not necessarily easy, way to go Mary. I also like that she found herself a niche that she could perfect.
Norgerie: It seems to me she must have had a good handle on structure calculations and soil to be working on these difficult sites. But I can already imagine how stunning her portfolio must have been.
Jessica: in 1913, Mary would be commissioned to design the campus for the Pine Mountain Settlement School in Kentucky - which pause right here, because the listener that I mentioned at the top of the episode Jenny - she is on the board of this school board - (so stay tuned to our wrap up and or show notes, I have to reach out to her to see what additional info she may have about Mary)
Lizi: ooooo I LOVE that connection.
Norgerie: Me too. I wonder if their school is on a hill too.
(This is also good Time to hear a word from our sponsors)
Jessica: SO Mary designed the campus and some buildings for the School which was the first rural application of the model of the settlement schools like Jane Addams’s Hull House
Lizi: Very cool! So fun the connection to Jane and that the settlement house model was expanding.
Jessica: So it was essentially a boarding school in rural Kentucky that taught kids, but also taught them about livestock, dairying, furniture making, weaving, and home nursing. Over the years she would continue to build different parts of the campus. She would use the local materials from the site (something that she was known for). And she served as the school’s architect/ consultant all the way until 1968. The school now has been designated a National Historic Landmark.
Norgerie: Wow! What an honor!!!
Lizi: Amazing! I like that she stayed connected to the project for years afterward.
Jessica: So in 1921 - Mary at age 44 marries Ingram D. Hook. He was an attorney and that’s what we know about him also a major key fact- he was a huge supporter of Mary’s career ( which we know that in the 1920s it can be rare). Which I think was her main fear about getting married - but Ingram darling was a peach.
Norgerie: That's so wonderful, especially after hearing about those criminals at the Beaux Arts and their major efforts to keep her away from the profession, it's good to know her family and now her husband supported her every step of the way.
Lizi: LOVE. Ingram sounds like good people. Yeah I can imagine that if you were a career woman, that getting married sounded pretty risky. I am glad she was able to find someone who supported her work and didn’t want to put her in a societal box.
Jessica: ooh together they would adopt two sons! And they lived all together in a new home that Mary designed for their family.
Lizi: SO CUTE! I love that they were able to create a family in the way that worked for them. And I bet the house was lovely.
Norgerie: You know it!
Jessica: And Mary’s career was booming. In 1923, she would partner with Eric Douglas Macwilliam Remington to create the firm called Hook and Remington. It would last almost 10 years until Eric decided to move to California.
Lizi: That’s really cool. I feel like when we hear about women during this era partnering with men in firms, it’s usually their husbands so it’s fun to hear about a male-female partnership that clearly thrived outside of marriage.
Jessica: Mary would design several homes for the wealthy people of Kansas City. She is credited with being the first to design a home with an attached garage in Kansas City.
Lizi: oooo leveling up the people of Kansas City.
Norgerie: Very nice!
Jessica: she was also the first to do a cast-in place concrete foundation
Norgerie: such a pioneer!
Lizi: I love her innovating.
Jessica: There was also a rumor that she was the first to design a house with its own swimming pool (very new at the time) but I don’t think she was first in Kansas city - I later found a source that debunked that - but it’s still pretty cool.
Norgerie: Well maybe we can say she was ONE of the firsts.
Lizi: Well either way if she wasn’t the first, it sounds like she was still on the cutting edge as an early designer of a house with a pool.
Jessica: I mentioned it when she did Pine Mountain school, but she used a lot of salvaged material like tiles and stone.
Norgerie: This lady is LEED Gold before LEED
Jessica: There are many homes that still exist today, that we can see. Folks will have to visit our shownotes for more information on that. Some are also listed on the National Register of Historic places.
Lizi: Can’t wait to see these homes in the show notes and it’s awesome to hear that a lot of them are still around and being preserved.
Norgerie: We really really need a list of archventures!
Jessica: I did want to call out one of her iconic houses called the Pink house because of its Pink Stucco Exterior. It is supposed to reference the San Francisco World’s Fair back in 1915
Norgerie: ooooo a Pink House!!! I was expecting like a barbie playhouse, but no the pink is nice an subtle, I like how it plays with the green windows and the terracotta roof tiles.
Lizi: Oh it’s very cute. Love the green windows and brick with the pink stucco. Funny about the SF reference. It does look like a house that could be in certain SF neighborhoods. I wonder if that architecture style was prominently featured at the World’s Fair? I’m assuming she went to the World’s Fair? Since she’s a traveling girlie?
Jessica: yes! She went to the World’s fair - that’s where she the example the first time. But you do bring up a good point. We always hear either specific things that our ladies did or maybe saw at the world’s fair and maybe even their contributions but never about the other stuff. Like what other things were showcased. We should really do charette on this.
Norgerie: Great idea Jessica, can't wait to hear what you share with us about this.
Jessica: I guess before then, she hadn’t seen many pink houses but the other feature she took from the World’s fair was that this house had 3 balconies. It’s really cute - this is also the home that her family would live in. This house was just one of three on the land that she purchased. So basically home girl is kinda like a real estate developer. She bought three homes next to each other and kinda created this cul-de-sac.
Norgerie: Level Up, Level Up
Lizi: oooo developer status. I love it. That’s so fun that this is the house they lived in.
Jessica: Perhaps it while on vacay - but Mary would take her talents to Florida, specifically Sarasota. In 1935, Mary would purchase 55 acres of beachfront land for just $10,000. She set aside some land for architects to try out new design ideas, a section that she named Whispering Sand Inn which was meant for writers and artists but anybody could probably go, and then there was her third home for her family that she called Sandy Cove.
Lizi: She’s collecting houses left and right. I also really like this writers artists colony that she developed and that she set aside land for architects to experiment. So fun!
Norgerie: What an interesting thing to do. I wonder if and how she made money out of this, did she rent the land or the spaces to the writers and the architects?
Jessica: Before I get into that let’s talk about Whispering Sands. Because my initial resources says that it was artist and writers colony which it pretty well could be but all in all it was paradise - at least that’s how they advertised it. Get this description from the advertisement pamphlet:
“One of the most interesting and unique Inns in Florida… Upon arrival, one enters a yellow door and steps straight into a spacious patio shaded by tall palms and papaya trees, and decked with purpose and flaming bougainvillea like frescoes in the sun. At the far end of the patio under the open sky, almost touching the Inn is the blue water of the bayou, its shore and unspoiled wilderness of palm and pine. Beyond is a white expanse of feathery sand, studded with beautiful shells, that hardly has its equal in the world, and then the blue-green waters of the Gulf of Mexico…Turning from the view to look at the buildings, which form the court, one realizes the art that has used such simple forms to achieve harmony and variety. All are built of the same silvery grey cypress wood.”
Norgerie: Take me there now.
Jessica: So to answer your question Norgerie, with a description like that …. That’s how she made her money or ROI. Mary’s work on this and popularity would become basically the model for future Siesta Key Developments.
Fun fact: Siesta Key is one of my favorite beaches in Florida. I briefly lived in Tampa in another lifetime and would always take my friends and family that were visiting to that beach. If I had to pick which side of Florida had the beaches I would definitely say it was the Gulf Coast Side.
Norgerie: Interesting! The only Gulf beach I know is Galveston, not making the list of prettiest beach. Good to know there's a variety in the Gulf Coast.
Jessica: okay back to all of this land …Since we are talking about 55 acres of land. She not only designed a house for herself but a house for her sons and their families. Some of the land that was supposed to be for architects to experiment on was also meant for the local architecture school which I thought was cool.
Lizi: ooo that is cool.
Norgerie: Did the school happen? Does it exist today?
Jessica: yes and no. It looks to have been a school but now when you look into it, Sarasota Architecture School is referred to the local architectural style. So that part of land that became the incubator for architects was the birth place of the Sarasota Architecture School was something that Mary and architect Paul Rudolph started. They built two houses in the style that would become Sarasota Architecture.
I do have a bone to pick though because in my research looking more into this style of architecture that they refer to Sarasota Architecture School … they don’t mention Mary.
Norgerie: Terrible
And there was a school of design of some sort- it would become New College now it’s part the University of South Florida. So if you were to look up Sarasota School of architecture it would refer to the style which there are plenty of examples that exist today that we can check out.
in 1950 at the age 73, Mary would retire. I’m not sure what she did in retirement - maybe played bingo
Norgerie: Maybe, I'd go play with her.
Jessica: And another interesting thing I found out - Mary applied to become an AIA member twice and got rejected both times.
Lizi: So sad. But not the first time we’ve heard that.
Norgerie: Not cool. Not that it matters but was it her local AIA chapter in Kansas or AIA National?
Jessica: you know that’s a good question. In my research they never specified- so it makes me wonder was the local AIA Chapter denying her and AIA National would have accepted women at the time? And for that matter, what was the AIA set up at the time. If you are an AIA member, you know that there is the National due, the state level, and then the city level that goes into your membership fee - so I’m curious if there are barriers and at which level
Norgerie: Glad we're past this and the national and city AIA welcomes everyone with open arms now.
Jessica:. But then in 1977 on Mary’s 100th birthday, Mary gave a tour in Kansas City of her projects, and the AIA gives her a plaque for distinguished service.
Lizi: Wait what!?!
Norgerie: She was alive at 100 and she was giving tours of her own projects? Is this what she did in retirement? Cause that is way way cooler than bingo. I need to rethink my retirement goals.
Lizi: Yeah that, but more importantly, I mean obviously they should be giving her a plaque but the hypocrisy of giving her a plaque when they wouldn’t accept her into the AIA is SO maddening.
Norgerie: Well not to play devil's advocate but we have to look at it in the context of the times. She was denied twice way earlier in the 1900s one would hope, but then in 1977, when they gave her a plaque would have been a great time to officially give her AIA membership too. But I'm still confused, so was it a surprise event? The AIA knew she would be giving a tour and organized a plaque ceremony to surprise her?
Jessica: you know.. it’s not like they specified this. She was giving a tour of the house she designed, I don’t think it was a surprise but maybe highly publicized. Think home tours that exist today. Now when she received the plaque? Did it coincidentally arrive around that time? Was it a plaque from AIA National or local AIA Kansas? It would make sense that AIA Kansas would give her the award because they most likely knew of the tour happening - making it easier to give her the award.
A year later, at the age of 101, Mary would pass away in her Siesta Key home.
Lizi: Holy moly she lived a long life. Wow, I feel like Mary really did a lot. Not only with designing so many houses, but development and pushing other architects forward. Such an impressive story.
Norgerie: Seriously! So glad a listener put her on our radar at the right time for us to learn about her. Thank you again, Jenny And thank you Jessica for taking this on and sharing her story with us.
Jessica: Well I have to Second and third my thank you to Jenny and I hope that she is listening .
Jessica: Alright, now we have reached the second half of our episode the Caryatid, this is where we select a woman living today who is doing her thing, furthering the profession, and whose work continues to hold the profession up just like the caryatids or columns shaped like women found on greek style buildings.
Jessica: so without further adieu …. this week’s caryatid goes to Chandra Moore
Whoo
Jessica: Chandra is an architect, a developer, who runs her own design firm, called coG Studio, which she started back in 2011 after walking away from the big corporate architecture firm. Before that, she spent years working on huge projects like stadiums, airports, children’s hospitals, and universities all over the world.
Lizi: Sounds like a big career shift!
At her firm they design everything from luxury homes and multi-family housing to retail spaces, offices, and community hubs. They’ve created over 845 housing units across the U.S., always with a focus on people-first design and strong community engagement.
Norgerie: That's what it should be about.
Lizi: That sounds amazing.
So she has an office in Atlanta and Detroit and that’s what drew me to her. I was looking for an architect in the Midwest. So what I also found about her is that she has worked with another Detroit lady and Gabl friend Saundra Little!
Norgerie: cool!!
Lizi: So great! We love Detroit, and we love Saundra!
Jessica: Before we say goodbye we want to say thank you to CMYK for the music, John W our technical advisor. And most of all thank you for listening!
Lizi: Remember to check out our show notes for links to all of our resources on this episode as well as pictures of projects we’ve talked about.
Norgerie: We hope you enjoyed learning about today’s lady and caryatid along with our banter, and that you are inspired to find out more about them and other amazing professional ladies. Again, thank you.
jessica: She Builds Podcast is a member of the Gābl Media podcast network. Gābl Media is curated thought leadership for an audience dedicated to building a better world. Listen and subscribe to all the shows at gablmedia.com. That’s G A B L media.com.
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Jessica: We are excited to hear from you and for you to come back and keep learning about bosses with us. You can email us your thoughts at shebuildspodcast@gmail.com, leave a comment on our website shebuildspodcast.com, or follow us on instagram and facebook @shebuildspodcast, and on X @shebuildspod. See ya!
References
Kesman, Cecilia. “MARY ROCKWELL HOOK 1877-1978.” UN DIA | UNA ARQUITECTA 2, 30 Oct. 2016, undiaunaarquitecta2.wordpress.com/2016/11/02/mary-rockwell-hook-1877-1978.
Observer, Architectural. “Mary Rockwell Hook: Ahead of Her Time.” Architectural Observer, 27 June 2019, architecturalobserver.com/mary-rockwell-hook-ahead-of-her-time/?utm_source=chatgpt.com.
Pine Mountain Settlement School. “MARY ROCKWELL HOOK Architect Trustee - Pine Mountain Settlement School.” Pine Mountain Settlement School, 6 Feb. 2025, pinemountainsettlement.net/?page_id=2042.
Reeder, Linda. “Mary Rockwell Hook, Architect and Developer — THE ARCHITECTRESS.” THE ARCHITECTRESS, 14 Sept. 2022, www.lindareederwriter.com/blog/mary-rockwell-hook?utm_source=chatgpt.com.
“What We Do — Pine Mountain Settlement School.” Pine Mountain Settlement School, www.pinemountainsettlementschool.com/what-we-do.
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