# Verna Cook Salomonsky

Verna Cook Salomonsky (1890–1978) was a pioneering early 20th-century American architect known for her work as a solo practitioner in residential communities outside of New York in the 1920s and 1930s and later as an author on architectural design and history. Following the death of her first husband, Edgar Salomonsky, in 1929, she maintained her own practice and designed several hundred homes, including a model home for the New York World's Fair in 1939. In the 1960s, she and her second husband, Warren Butler Shipway, wrote several books on Mexican domestic architecture and design.

## Education

Verna Cook was born in Spokane, Washington on October 19, 1890, to Harlan J. Cook, a local businessman, and Mara S. Taylor Cook. Cook attended Spokane High school, graduating in 1908, and then enrolled for a year at The Misses Gilman's School for Girls in Boston, Massachusetts. She subsequently traveled to Paris and enrolled at the École Spéciale d'Architecture for two years, returning to the United States in October 1911. After saving up enough money to continue schooling and the shutdown of École Spéciale d'Architecture due to World War I, she began two and a half years of coursework at Columbia University's School of Architecture from 1915 to 1918 instead.

## Career

In 1913, Cook began working as a junior drafter in the office of William Knighton in Salem, Oregon. After leaving Knighton's offices in 1915, she returned to New York City in 1916 to begin a three-year long position as a general drafter and designer in the office of Dwight James Baum. During this three-year period, she also worked for three months in 1917 for Howard Major and six months in 1918 for Electus D. Litchfield.
By 1920, Cook had married fellow Columbia graduate Edgar Salomonsky and the couple established their own firm, focusing largely on residential architecture. Their offices were located at 368 Lexington Avenue until 1921, when they moved to 331 Madison Avenue; in the late 1920s they were located at 40 East 49th Street and by 1936, they were located at 424 Madison Avenue.
During the late 1920s, Cook also created the designs for several lines of "boudoir accessories" including hand mirrors, combs, and hairbrushes. She also analyzed furniture alongside her husband around this time.
After Edgar's death in 1929, Verna continued to practice alone, completing hundreds of residences in the New York metropolitan area and later in California. Her work primarily relied on traditional vocabularies, including Georgian, Colonial and English style houses as well as eclectic combinations of various styles. In 1936, House and Garden selected her firm to design the magazine's first "Ideal House," which was exhibited as a model home in the "Town of Tomorrow" at the 1939 World's Fair in New York. By 1937, she was a registered architect in New York, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania and had served as a critic for one semester at the School of Design for Women in Philadelphia, PA and for three years at the New York School of Interior Decoration in New York City. Cook was also among the first female members of the Architectural League of New York; the League opened its membership to women in 1934, and in 1936, Cook was the only female architect admitted. She retired from practicing architecture in 1939 due to issues with her eyesight.
In 1939, Cook married her second husband, Warren Butler Shipway, a 1921 graduate of Princeton University with a degree in civil engineering. The couple moved to California in 1947, and travel to Mexico in the 1950s inspired five books on historic and contemporary Mexican residential architecture, cowritten by Cook and her husband.
Cook died in September of 1978 in La Jolla, California, where she moved to in 1972 following her husband's death, and her archives today reside at the University of California at San Diego.

## Built works

* House in Fieldston (1920), Riverdale, New York City, with Edgar Salomonsky
* House of M.F. Griffin (1928), Scarsdale, N.Y., with Edgar Salomonsky
* House of Raymond Faith (1928), Bryn Mawr Park, N.Y., with Edgar Salomonsky
* House of Edgar Salomonsky, Scarsdale, N.Y., with Edgar Salomonsky
* C.E. Wells House (1929), Woodland Park, Summit, New Jersey, with Edgar Salomonsky
* House of Clifford Walsh (1933), Scarsdale, N.Y.
* C. Ernest Greenwood House (1933), Scarsdale, N.Y.
* Tauton Road House (1934), Scarsdale, N.Y.
* Lockwood and Axtell Drive House (1934), Scarsdale, N.Y.
* House in Berkley, Scarsdale (1933)
* Marjorie Warren House (1933) North Castle, NY
* Dr. Herman Prange House (1934), Scarsdale, NY
* House of C.G. Novotny (1935), Scarsdale, NY
* Residence of A.W. Brown (1936), Scarsdale, NY
* Pugliese House (1938), Harrison, NY
* Dwight and Kate Wade House (1940), Sevierville, Tennessee. National Register of Historic Places (1997).

## Awards

* Third prize, Loeb Prize of the Society of Beaux Arts Architects, 1915.
* First Prize, "Brick House." Small House Competition, 1921.
* Second prize, Small House Competition sponsored by The House Beautiful, 1927.
* House and Garden magazine's first "Ideal House," 1936.

## Publications

* Salomonsky, Verna Cook. "The Year-Round Service Porch, Half Indoors, Half Out, a Constant Delight." (Illustrations by the Author.)The Washington Post, Apr 07, 1924.
* Salomonsky, Verna Cook and Edgar Salomonsky. An exemplar of antique furniture design : a collection of measured drawings of furniture in the Metropolitan Museum of Art accompanied with photographs and text. Grand Rapids: Periodical Publishing Company, 1923.
* Shipway, Verna Cook. Masterpieces of furniture, in photographs and measured drawings. New York: Dover Publications, 1953.
* Shipway, Verna Cook and Warren Shipway, The Mexican House, Old & New. New York: Architectural Book Publishing Company, 1960.
* Shipway, Verna Cook and Warren Shipway, Mexican interiors. New York: Architectural Book Publishing Company, 1962.
* Shipway, Verna Cook and Warren Shipway, Mexican homes of today. New York: Architectural Book Publishing Company, 1964.
* Shipway, Verna Cook and Warren Shipway, Decorative design in Mexican homes. New York: Architectural Book Publishing Company, 1966.
* Shipway, Verna Cook and Warren Shipway, Houses of Mexico; origins and traditions. New York: Architectural Book Publishing Company, 1970.

## References and sources

* 1 2 3 4 Allaback, Sarah (2008). The First American Women Architects. Chicago: University of Illinois Press. p. 214.
* 1 2 "Verna Cook Shipway Papers, 1894 - 1979 MSS 105". UC San Diego Libraries.
* 1 2 Chaise, Anne (March 8, 2012). "Les pionnières de l'architecture : premières femmes à l'ESA". Société des Architectes Diplômés de l'École Speciale d'Architecture.
* ↑ Year: 1900; Census Place: Spokane Ward 3, Spokane, Washington; Roll: 1751; Page: 14A; Enumeration District: 0067; FHL microfilm: 1241751Ancestry.com. 1900 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2004.
* 1 2 Ettinger, Catherine R., ""Designing Houses Is Like Having Babies": Verna Cook and the Practice of Architecture in the 1920s and 1930s", The Routledge Companion to Women in Architecture, doi:10.4324/9780429278891-6, retrieved 2022-12-03
* 1 2 3 4 5 6 Salomonsky, Verna Cook, Membership Files, The American Institute of Architects Archives, The AIA Historical Directory of American Architects, s.v. “Salomonsky, Verna Cook,” (ahd1038963), http://public.aia.org/sites/hdoaa/wiki/Wiki%20Pages/ahd1038963.aspx (accessed October 1, 2015)
* ↑ Year: 1920; Census Place: Manhattan Assembly District 13, New York, New York; Roll: T625_1208; Page:16A; Enumeration District: 944; Image: 723Ancestry.com. 1920 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2010. Images reproduced by FamilySearch.
* 1 2 "BUYS IN WOODLAND PARK.: C.E. Wells Acquires Cotswold Farmhouse Type of Home". New York Times: N22. May 19, 1929.
* ↑ "Architects Lease on East Side". New York Times: 46. 5 April 1927.
* ↑ "PERSONALS". The American Architect and the Architectural Review. 120 (2380): 376. 9 November 1921.
* ↑ "Display Ad 55". Chicago Daily Tribune: E2. Dec 15, 1929.
* ↑ "Advertisement: Lucite (Lucite Hanger Co.)". Vogue. 7 (72): 112b. 29 September 1928.
* 1 2 Salomonsky, Verna Cook (1923). "An exemplar of antique furniture design : a collection of measured drawings of furniture in the Metropolitan Museum of Art accompanied with photographs and text". Thomas J. Watson Library Digital Collections. Retrieved 2020-02-05.
* ↑ "Obituary 6". New York Times: 21. December 27, 1929.
* ↑ "A Preview of Houses in Town of Tomorrow; One the Architect Had 'Never Seen Before'". New York Herald Tribune: C5. 23 April 1939.
* ↑ "WOMEN IN ARCHITECTURAL ARTS". The New York Times: X10. 23 February 1936.
* 1 2 3 4 Morton, Patricia. "Shipway, Verna Cook Salomonsky." Manuscript, Profile for the Beverly Willis Dynamic National Archive. Accessible via http://www.bwaf.org/dna/
* ↑ Ancestry.com. Virginia, Marriage Records, 1936-2014 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015. Original data: Virginia, Marriages, 1936-2014. Virginia Department of Health, Richmond, Virginia.
* ↑ Catalogue of Princeton University. Princeton, NJ: University of Princeton. 1922. p. 309.
* ↑ Morton, Patricia. "Pioneering Women of American Architecture". Pioneering Women of American Architecture. Retrieved 2022-12-03.
* ↑ "A House at Fieldston, N. Y., Designed for an Artist". Building Age (42, no. 8: 36). 1 August 1920.
* ↑ "House of M.F. Griffin, Scarsdale, N.Y.". American Architect (133): 55. January 1928.
* ↑ "House of Raymond Faith, Bryn Mawr Park, N.Y.". Architecture. 58 (1): 49. July 1928.
* ↑ "House of Edgar Salomonsky, Scarsdale, N.Y.". Architecture. 58 (1): 51. July 1928.
* ↑ "House of Clifford Walsh at Scarsdale, New York - Verna Cook Salomonsky, Architect, Lucile Schlimme, Interior Decorator". Architectural Record. 74 (2): 121–136. August 1933.
* ↑ "WESTCHESTER ITEMS". The New York Times: 37. 19 October 1933.
* ↑ "News of Realty in City's Suburbs". New York Herald Tribune: 28. 24 March 1934.
* ↑ "WESTCHESTER ITEMS". New York Times: 38. 22 June 1934.
* ↑ "Westchester and Connecticut Leaders Express Optimistic Views on Realty". New York Herald Tribune: C1. 7 May 1933.
* ↑ Register of Verna Cook Shipway Papers, 1894 - 1979. University of San Diego, Mandeville Special Collections Library. MSS 105. Request Box: 7 Folder: 12 Oversize: MC02508.
* ↑ Register of Verna Cook Shipway Papers, 1894 - 1979. University of San Diego, Mandeville Special Collections Library. MSS 105. Request Box: 7 Folder: 19 Oversize: MC04206
* ↑ "House of C.G. Novotny, Scarsdale, N.Y.". Architecture. 71 (3): 145. March 1935.
* ↑ "RESIDENCE OF A. W. BROWN, SCARSDALE, NEW YORK. Verna Cook Salomonsky, Architect". Architectural Record. 79 (3). Photograph by Harold Haliday Costain.: Frontispiece March 1936.{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
* ↑ Register of Verna Cook Shipway Papers, 1894 - 1979. University of San Diego, Mandeville Special Collections Library. MSS 105. Request Box: 7 Folder: 39 Oversize: MC04305
* ↑ Reggev, Kate (August 22, 2022). "Flourishes and Fame: Early Award-Winning Female Architects". Madame Architect. Retrieved 2022-12-03.
* ↑ "Small Houses at Moderate Cost". Building Age. 4 (43): 20. 1 April 1921.