On St Patrick's Day in 1974, Louis Kahn met an anonymous death in the always unpleasant Men's Bathroom in Penn Station, New York. A sad end to such an inspired life. Kahn has always been an architect's architect- revered among the profession yet unknown outside of it. What those unfamiliar with his work are missing include the sublime plaza of the Salk Institute, the bold and unmistakable geometry of Dacca or the Exeter Library, the silence and light of the Kimball Art Museum.

Richards Medical Research Laboratories
(1961) Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States

Louis Kahn's first well known work was in his hometown at the same university where he received his architectural degree. The Richards Medical Center (exhibited at MoMA in 1963) became a favorite with architects though not with those who actually had to work in it.

Click here to find your way around Penn to the Richards Medical Research Laboratories, somewhere on Hamilton Walk near the west end of the campus

Salk Institute of Biological Studies
(1966) La Jolla, California, United States

You've seen the pictures and probably have a good idea what's there, what to expect, how you're supposed to feel. Still nothing really prepares you for your first visit to that plaza. Unlike anywhere else.

Click here to start planning your pilgrimage. The Salk offeres tours if you feel the desire to see something more than the plaza.

Kimbell Museum
(1972) Fort Worth, Texas, United States

The best reason to visit Fort Worth, the Kimbell Museum hosts an ecclectic collection of art from Pre-Columbian artifacts all the way up to Mondrian.

Click here to see the collection without all the distraction of those naturally lit vaults

Yale Center for British Art
(1974) New Haven, Connecticut, United States

On Chapel Street, directly across from Kahn's 1954 Yale University Art Center and a half block away from Paul Rudolph's Art and Architecture Building, the Yale Center for British Art is worth the trouble regardless of how you feel about British Art.

Click here to learn about the Yale Center for British Art's often painfully early hours, apparently British Art fans need to be home before dark

Bangladesh National Assembly
(1982) Dhaka, Bangladesh

Designed to be built using local construction techniques, the locals kept building nine years after Kahn's death. What they ended up with was a place like no other, as good a monument to Kahn and Bangladesh as anyone could ever hope.

Click here to start thinking about the Sangsad Bhaban, Mosquito Control and Public Toilets at the Dhaka City Corporation's official site. It's a start

Louis I. Kahn: In the Realm of Architecture
by David B. Brownlee
(1991) Rizzoli

The definitive Louis Kahn monograph. Everything is here, with pictures and sections- a great way to start to understand projects best understood in person... (read more)

Louis I. Kahn: Complete Works 1935-1974
by Heinz Ronner
Birkhauser
(reprint 1987)

Louis I. Kahn: Complete Works
by Klaus-Peter Gast
Prestel
(2001)

Louis I. Kahn: The Idea of Order
Princeton Architectural Press
(1998)

Louis Kahn's Situated Modernism
by Sarah Williams Goldhagen, Louis I. Kahn
Publisher: Yale Univ Pr
(May 1, 2001)

Louis I. Kahn : Unbuilt Masterworks
by Kent Larson, Vincent Scully
Publisher: Monacelli Pr
(October 2, 2000)

Louis I. Kahn: Conversations With Students
by Louis Kahn
Publisher: Princeton Architectural Press
(October 1998)

See more recommended books at books.ArBITAT.com