Tributes to Minnesota Architecture Writer Bette Hammel
The beloved member of the Minnesota architecture community passed away at 99 in late November
By Chris Hudson | December 19, 2024
Bette Hammel being interviewed for the Minnesota Modern Masters oral history project in 2016.
FEATURE
ENTER mourns the loss of Bette Hammel, a beloved architectural storyteller. Bette has a special place in the history of architecture journalism in Minnesota. In the weeks since her passing on November 23, we’ve been reflecting on her life and work.
My favorite Bette memory is from 2011, when she was 86. The landmark Winton Guest House, designed by Frank Gehry, had recently been moved from its original location in Wayzata, Minnesota, to the Gainey Conference Center in Owatonna, 110 miles south. Several dozen reporters, preservationists, and design enthusiasts gathered at the site to hear Gehry’s thoughts on the relocation. When the architect completed his walk around the building, there was an awkward silence among the starstruck attendees. Bette marched through the gaggle and asked the first question, without introduction. Gehry smiled, and the conversation was underway.
Bette Jones graduated from the University of Minnesota School of Journalism in 1947 and embarked on a career in radio, public relations, and advertising. In 1969, a friend, architect Carl Graffunder, introduced her to Richard Hammel, cofounder of Hammel, Green and Abrahamson (now HGA). Bette and Dick married in 1970.
Soon after Dick’s untimely death in 1986, Curt Green and Bruce Abrahamson asked Bette to write a history of their firm. She completed that work in 1989.
“Bette Hammel’s skill as an architectural historian was showcased in the book From Bauhaus to Bowties, which documents HGA’s first 35 years as a firm,” says HGA CEO Mia Blanchett, AIA. “Now, as we approach 75 years, we continue to be grateful for Bette’s persistent research and interviews that brought the people to life who have influenced the design and engineering culture and longevity of our practice.”
Bette would go on to write regular columns for the Minneapolis Skyway News (later renamed Downtown Journal) and a range of articles for Architecture MN (this publication’s predecessor) and other local and national magazines. Over the past 15 years, she authored or coauthored several more books, including the three installments of the Legendary Homes/Great Houses series, with photographer Karen Melvin.
Below are remembrances from two people who knew Bette well.
From Gary Reetz, FAIA, retired HGA vice president:
I first met Bette at her home in Minnetonka, at an annual cross-country ski party she held for the entire HGA office. She was a gracious host in a house originally designed by Elizabeth Close that doubled in size with an addition by her husband, Dick Hammel.
Gary Reetz, FAIA
As she explained how the expansion complemented the original design, I learned she was a professional writer on architecture. Bette seemed to know many in the architectural community—in Minnesota and beyond. She inquired on people’s views on architecture and listened intently. She had strong opinions herself.
Nearly a decade ago, Bette was invited by the Minnesota chapter of the Society of Architectural Historians to be interviewed as part of their Minnesota Modern Masters oral history project. At the beginning of the interview, she declared that she “loved architecture and loved meeting architects because they do important work to improve our world.”
She liked to repeat a quote by Dick that appeared on the cover of Time magazine over a picture of the national-award-winning Colonial Church of Edina: “We are designing for the celebration of human life.”
Bette was a beloved cheerleader and advocate for inspiring architecture her entire life.
From Linda Mack, architectural historian and retired Star Tribune architecture critic:
I first met Bette in 1986 when I wrote an obituary for her late husband, Dick Hammel, for Architecture MN magazine. We soon became friends.
Linda Mack
After Dick’s untimely death, Bette took up writing about architecture. She wrote a history commemorating HGA’s 35th anniversary and started writing for Skyway News and other publications, including national architecture magazines. So, at every important AIA Minnesota event or announcement of a new building, I would run into Bette. She eventually authored a series of coffee table books on architecturally significant houses of the Twin Cities.
The one word I would use to describe Bette is plucky. She didn’t let much stop her. As a young woman, she became an advertising copywriter. As a freelance journalist, she managed to get a gig covering Grace Kelly’s wedding. As an older woman, she sailed in the Adriatic. She loved to ply Lake Minnetonka in the motorboat she shared with a friend, and even last summer, when she was 99 and her eyesight was failing, she was hoping my husband Warren and I would take her out.
Warren and I were lucky to have bought a beach cottage on Madeline Island next to her dear friend Jack Dietrich, so we enjoyed her visits with Jack as well.
In the last couple of years, I would meet her at the Glenn in Minnetonka and we would go to lunch nearby. Then I would lift her walker out of the trunk, and she would take off on her own.
Godspeed, Bette!