The Builders: Shaping Minnesota's Architectural Landscape on the Color Line Exhibit 

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Enjoy the new exhibit The Builders: Shaping Minnesota's Architectural Landscape on the Color Line by the African American Interpretive Center of Minnesota.

This exhibit showcases the social history of three black Minnesotans who impacted the architecture and design of Minneapolis and St. Paul: Clarence "Cap" W. Wigington, Casiville Bullard, and William Hazel.

The exhibit features maps and blueprints that will encourage visitors to appreciate familiar Twin Cities buildings in a new way. Cap Wigington's designs for the Winter Carnival Ice Castles and the Highland Park Water Tower made him a force in Minnesota architectural circles.

His contemporary, Casiville Bullard, left Tennessee for Minnesota in the late 1890s to complete stonework on the State Capitol. As a stoneworker Bullard contributed his skill to a variety of structures in the state including Pilgrim Baptist Church, the St. Paul Cathedral, and the Foshay Tower.

William Hazel was a known architect and sought-after stained glass artist, and his move to Minnesota grabbed the attention of local Minnesotans when The Appeal newspaper announced his arrival.

The exhibit will also create a snapshot of the racial climate in which the builders performed their craft and illustrate what career development looked like for black people in Minnesota in the 19th- and 20th-centuries.