A. Darabondi

Full name: Asa Daribondi. Born 28 MAY 1886; disappeared 1950; declared dead 2 SEP 1960. Architect of record for the conversion of the Lundine mansion into the McAllistor Building apartment complex (permit addendum 2 MAR 1953). From the Art Life Dossier and The Daribondi Clipping.

Spelling

Sources spell it both **"Darabondi"** and **"Daribondi."** Tracked here under Darabondi; first name **Asa** per The Daribondi Clipping.

Chicago Origins (The Daribondi Clipping)

A ~1906 Chicago newspaper hailed the "young Asa Daribondi" as Chicago's "Picasso" of architecture — a native prodigy whose strange buildings came to him in his dreams and were appearing in wealthy neighborhoods near the lake (Lake Michigan).

He Builds From Dreams — and He's From Chicago

**Dream-architecture** is exactly what the night floors are (a structure grown from a sleeper's dream — The Sleeping Man's Library). Daribondi was doing it in **Chicago decades before** the 1953 Lundine conversion. And **Chicago** is where **Decraig Corp** (the induction-kit supplier) is based. The architect who designed the impossible building may have been designing impossible buildings his whole life.

Criminal Record

Suspected of having drowned at least five — possibly up to twenty — children between 1947 and 1950. Never tried; disappeared in 1950.

A Vanished Man's Signature on a Later Permit

Darabondi **disappeared in 1950** yet is the **architect of record on the 1953 refit permit** — work credited to a man three years after he vanished. Same impossibility as the paperwork that is 50 years old yet recent, and the tenants whose minds go up while their bodies sleep.

Same Birthday as the Owner

**28 MAY 1886** — the **exact birthday of Henry Lundine**, the building's owner. Architect and owner, born the same day. A doubling of the kind the case keeps producing.

Open Questions

A suspected serial drowner of children designed the building's layout — including, presumably, whatever geometry supports the night floors. Is the impossible architecture his?
Where did he go in 1950? (Same year Charles Lundine hanged himself.)
Relationship to Star Corporation and to Henry Lundine beyond the shared birthday.