Company type | Private |
---|---|
Industry | Architectural manufacturer |
Predecessors | Celadon Terra Cotta Company, Ludowici Roofing Tile Company, Celadon Roofing Tile Company, Ludowici-Celadon Inc. |
Founded | 1888 (as Celadon Terra Cotta Company)Alfred, New York, U.S. | ,
Headquarters | , United States |
Key people |
|
Products | Roofing Tile, Floor Tile, Wall Cladding |
Website | ludowici |
Ludowici Roof Tile, LLC., based in New Lexington, Ohio, is an American manufacturer of clay roof tiles, floor tiles, and wall cladding. The company was established in 1888 with the formation of the Celadon Terra Cotta Company in Alfred, New York. It has created tile for many prominent buildings throughout the United States. [1]
Carl Ludowici was a machinist in Ensheim, Germany and in 1857 he purchased a local roof tile factory and upgraded it with machines of his own design, founding the Carl Ludowici Ziegelwerke. The firm moved to a factory in Ludwigshafen in 1861 and slowly grew, largely due to the innovative nature of Ludowici's steam-powered tile press. After Carl's death in 1881, his sons Wilhelm and Franz took over the company, with Franz taking over business management and Wilhelm leading design and development. The company largely relocated to Jockgrim, where it grew into one of the major German tile manufacturers of its era. [2] [3]
In 1893 the Ludowicis licensed their patents and designs to the newly formed Ludowici Roofing Tile Company of Chicago. This company exhibited tiles at the World's Columbian Exposition that year and with its factory in Chicago Heights grew to become a leading producer of roof tiles by the turn of the century. [4] [5]
Ludowici built a factory in the unincorporated community of Liberty City, Georgia in 1902. As a tribute to the company, the city was incorporated as Ludowici, Georgia in 1905.
In 1888 a sculpting professor at Alfred University in Alfred, New York, found that the local supply of clay was well-suited for ornamental sculpting work, and found other local investors to form the Celadon Terra Cotta Company, named for the green hue the clay took on when salt-fired. [6] After visiting a friend in the area, George Herman Babcock became interested in the possibilities of terra cotta and bought stock, eventually becoming president of the company. As president he filed patents for multiple profiles of tile, such as the Conosera tile and unique combination tiles with different designs but a standard base, allowing for multiple styles of interlocking tile to be used on the same roof. [7] [8]
Babcock died in 1893, but the company continued to grow as it shifted focus towards roofing tile, and was renamed the Celadon Roofing Tile Company in 1900. [9] Shortly after this the New York State School of Clay-Working and Ceramics was established at Alfred University after lobbying by Celadon executives and others. The presence of this school allowed the company to collaborate with leading ceramicists of the time such as Charles Fergus Binns, who did extensive consulting work with Celadon. [10]
The Celadon Company purchased the Imperial Clay Company in 1905 and gained its factory in New Lexington, Ohio. [11]
In 1906 the companies merged to form the Ludowici-Celadon Company. [12] A plant in Coffeyville, Kansas was purchased in 1908, and in 1909 the factory in Alfred, New York burned to the ground. The company never rebuilt in the village, but the original Celadon Company office survived and remains there to this day. [13]
The factory in Ludowici, Georgia largely produced tiles for regional sales and had seen a decline in demand since the completion of tiles for the Panama Canal Zone. In October, 1913 the factory closed, and the next month the Ludowici-Celadon factory in Chicago Heights burned down, leaving the company with only its factories in New Lexington and Coffeyville. [14] [15]
The company grew through the first quarter of the century and was helped by the popularity of traditional terra cotta in architecture of the 1920s. To tap into this interest Ludowici-Celadon released The Tuileries Brochures in 1929, which contained articles written by prominent authors and architects such as Aymar Embury II, Frederick Ackerman, Jacques Carlu, and Hilaire Belloc. [16] [17]
During World War II the company suffered from a decline in domestic construction and supplemented its limited production of roof tile by temporarily opening pottery divisions in New Lexington and Coffeyville. Among other things these produced licensed cookie jars for Walt Disney. [18]
In 1956 the factory in Coffeyville, Kansas was closed due to declining demand for terra cotta tile, and in 1976 Ludowici-Celadon was purchased by CSC Inc. of Chicago. [19] [20] The company saw growth in the 1980s with a growing interest in historic restoration, and in 1986 sponsored a competition and exhibit with the National Building Museum on architectural terra cotta ornamentation. [21] CSC sold Ludowici-Celadon to CertainTeed, a division of Saint-Gobain, in 1989. [22]
CertainTeed shortened Ludowici-Celadon's name to Ludowici Roof Tile in 1994. Around 2002 Ludowici's management was transferred from CertainTeed to Terreal, another Saint-Gobain subsidiary. When Terreal spun off from Saint-Gobain in 2003, Ludowici went with it. [23]
Ludowici introduced wall cladding tile and in 2007 it opened its first showroom in a renovated former shipping building at its New Lexington factory. [24] A larger showroom was opened in Dallas, Texas in 2019 to act as a showcase for architects and designers in that area. [25] The Ludowici Roof Tile Company Historic District was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2021. [26]
In 2024 Terreal and its subsidiaries, including Ludowici, were sold to wienerberger of Austria. [27]
Ludowici has created tiles for prominent buildings through the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries, including the White House, the Pennsylvania State Capitol, the Plaza Hotel, the New York Life Building, the New York State Capitol, Wrigley Field and many buildings at Walt Disney World. [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33]
Ludowici is a city in Long County, Georgia, United States. The population was 1,703 at the 2010 Census and an estimated 2,221 in 2018. The city is the county seat of Long County. It is a part of the Hinesville-Fort Stewart metropolitan statistical area (MSA).
Terracotta, also known as terra cotta or terra-cotta, is a clay-based non-vitreous ceramic fired at relatively low temperatures. It is therefore a term used for earthenware objects of certain types, as set out below.
Alfred is a village located in the town of Alfred in Allegany County, New York, United States. The population was 4,026 at the 2020 census.
Alfred is a town in Allegany County, New York, United States. The population was 4,896 at the 2020 census.
Tiles are usually thin, square or rectangular coverings manufactured from hard-wearing material such as ceramic, stone, metal, baked clay, or even glass. They are generally fixed in place in an array to cover roofs, floors, walls, edges, or other objects such as tabletops. Alternatively, tile can sometimes refer to similar units made from lightweight materials such as perlite, wood, and mineral wool, typically used for wall and ceiling applications. In another sense, a tile is a construction tile or similar object, such as rectangular counters used in playing games. The word is derived from the French word tuile, which is, in turn, from the Latin word tegula, meaning a roof tile composed of fired clay.
Compagnie de Saint-Gobain S.A. is a French multinational corporation, founded in 1665 in Paris as the Manufacture royale de glaces de miroirs, and today headquartered on the outskirts of Paris, at La Défense and in Courbevoie. Originally a mirror manufacturer, it also produces a variety of construction, high-performance, and other materials. Saint-Gobain is present in 76 countries and as of 2022 employs more than 170,000 people.
Mather Tower is a Neo-Gothic, terra cotta-clad high-rise structure in Chicago, Illinois, United States. It is located at 75 East Wacker Drive in the downtown "loop" area, adjacent to the Chicago River.
George Herman Babcock was an American inventor. He and Stephen Wilcox co-invented a safer water tube steam boiler, and founded the Babcock & Wilcox boiler company.
Coffeyville Municipal Airport is a city-owned public-use airport four miles northeast of Coffeyville, in Montgomery County, Kansas, United States.
Architectural terracotta refers to a fired mixture of clay and water that can be used in a non-structural, semi-structural, or structural capacity on the exterior or interior of a building. Terracotta is an ancient building material that translates from Latin as "baked earth". Some architectural terracotta is stronger than stoneware. It can be unglazed, painted, slip glazed, or glazed.
CertainTeed is a North American manufacturer of building materials for both commercial and residential construction and is a wholly owned subsidiary of Saint-Gobain SA, based in Paris.
Terra Cotta Building is a historic office building and display center located at Alfred in Allegany County, New York. It was built in 1892 by the Celadon Terra Cotta Company. It is a one-story, 16-foot-wide (4.9 m), 25-foot-deep (7.6 m) building built almost entirely of bricks, ornamental terra cotta, and roofing tiles manufactured by Celadon. The building was designed as a sales office for the company, and was considered a "catalog" of their work. A replica was erected at the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago. The building was the only remaining structure after a fire broke out on August 29, 1909 and destroyed the Alfred factory of the Ludowici-Celadon Company.
Roof tiles are overlapping tiles designed mainly to keep out precipitation such as rain or snow, and are traditionally made from locally available materials such as clay or slate. Later tiles have been made from materials such as concrete, and plastic.
Gladding, McBean is a ceramics company located in Lincoln, California. It is one of the oldest companies in California, a pioneer in ceramics technology, and a company which has "contributed immeasurably" to the state's industrialization. During the heyday of architectural terra cotta, the company "dominated the industry in California and the Far West."
California pottery includes industrial, commercial, and decorative pottery produced in the Northern California and Southern California regions of the U.S. state of California. Production includes brick, sewer pipe, architectural terra cotta, tile, garden ware, tableware, kitchenware, art ware, figurines, giftware, and ceramics for industrial use. Ceramics include terra cotta, earthenware, porcelain, and stoneware products.
Alberhill is an unincorporated community in Riverside County, California. Alberhill is located 5.5 miles (8.9 km) northwest of Lake Elsinore. It lies at an elevation of 1234 feet. Alberhill was named after C.H. Albers and James and George Hill.
Structural clay tile describes a category of burned-clay building materials used to construct roofing, walls, and flooring for structural and non-structural purposes, especially in fireproofing applications. Also called building tile, structural terra cotta, hollow tile, saltillo tile, and clay block, the material is an extruded clay shape with substantial depth that allows it to be laid in the same manner as other clay or concrete masonry. In North America it was chiefly used during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, reaching peak popularity at the turn of the century and declining around the 1950s. Structural clay tile grew in popularity in the end of the nineteenth-century because it could be constructed faster, was lighter, and required simpler flat falsework than earlier brick vaulting construction.
American art pottery refers to aesthetically distinctive hand-made ceramics in earthenware and stoneware from the period 1870-1950s. Ranging from tall vases to tiles, the work features original designs, simplified shapes, and experimental glazes and painting techniques. Stylistically, most of this work is affiliated with the modernizing Arts and Crafts (1880-1910), Art Nouveau (1890–1910), or Art Deco (1920s) movements, and also European art pottery.
The New York Architectural Terra-Cotta Company was a manufacturer of architectural terracotta based in Queens, New York, U.S.
Ludowici Roof Tile Company Historic District is a historic district in New Lexington, Ohio. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2021.
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