“He consistently drew from the vernacular forms that connected him to his clients’ tastes,”[2] favoring the historical architectural precedents of Norman, Tudor, early Scandinavian, and American colonial.
[3] In 1922, he became a member of the American Institute of Architects (AIA),[4] and in 1948, he became Fellow, FAIA, “for his contribution to the advancement of the profession because of his achievement in design.”[4] “Lundie belongs to a generation who came to the profession with a background in the grand manner of the Beaux-Arts but went on to pursue a career devoted to the domestic work – a regionalist in the best sense of the word with work connecting to Scandinavian sources that no doubt resonated with many of his clients because of their ancestry but also seemed admirably suited to the lake country of northern Minnesota.” [5] Edwin H. Lundie was born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and at the age of thirteen, he moved with his parents to Salem, South Dakota.
When Mr. Gilbert moved entirely to his office in New York, Edwin Lundie worked briefly with Louis Lockwood (1864-1907) and continued as a draftsman for Thomas Holyoke while studying drawing at the Saint Paul School of Art.
His reassuring structures are models of his perfectionist bent, as well as expressions of his eye for beautiful materials: brick, stone, timber, wrought iron.
He had all the gifts, not the least of which was a lack of egotism, to make people’s dream houses come true.” [10] “He communicated his vision with clients and was inspired to express his ideas through presentation drawings and design.
Through finesse his designs extended toward what his clients found aesthetically pleasing and comfortable: a delivery of his integration of art and architecture.”[11] “In sharp contrast to the Modernists who were getting much of the attention during the height of his career, Lundie gravitated toward the classical.