The 20th-Century Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright is a UNESCO World Heritage Site consisting of eight buildings across the United States designed by American architect Frank Lloyd Wright.[1][2] These sites demonstrate his philosophy of organic architecture, designing structures that were in harmony with humanity and its environment. Wright's work had an international influence on the development of architecture in the 20th century.[3]
Through efforts led by the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy, a nonprofit organization, Taliesin and Taliesin West were jointly nominated as a World Heritage Site in the late 1980s.[6] The U.S. federal government endorsed the nomination,[7] but UNESCO rejected it because the organization wanted to see a larger nomination with more Wright properties.[6] In 2008, the National Park Service submitted ten Frank Lloyd Wright properties to a tentative World Heritage list.[8][9] It grew to 11 structures across seven U.S. states in July 2011,[10][11] out of more than 400 buildings reviewed by Wright experts.[12] The nominated buildings included two of Wright's studios; two office buildings; four private residences; and one museum, church, and government building each.[10][13] The buildings were selected because they were all also designated as U.S. National Historic Landmarks and because there were preservation plans in place for each building.[12]
The eight Wright buildings in the World Heritage Site are located in six U.S. states and were designed over a 50-year period.[2] The first building included, Unity Temple, was completed in 1908.[1] The last, the Guggenheim Museum, was completed in 1959,[1][2] although its design began in the 1940s.[27] All eight buildings are also listed as U.S. National Historic Landmarks.[17][28] These structures were nominated because, out of all of Wright's buildings, they were deemed "his masterpieces with the highest levels of integrity".[29]
Completed in 1908, this unprecedented church building used reinforced concrete in novel ways, creating a light-filled space with natural features. Its use of this single material has caused it to be thought of as the first "modern building" in the world.[31]
This 1910 single-family home is considered a masterpiece of the Prairie School of architecture. Its "broad, sweeping horizontal lines; low, cantilevered roofs with overhanging eaves; and an open interior floor plan, . . . epitomizes Wright's aim to design structures in harmony with nature."[32] A significant contributor to the concept of bringing nature indoors is the 175 leaded glass windows and doors, which feature a design of "abstraction of organic shapes".[33]
Begun in 1911 and expanded several times over the years,[34]Taliesin (Welsh for 'shining brow') became Wright's home, studio, and school of architecture. He built the large estate on the brow of a ridge, to be "'of the hill' not on it".[35] It may be his most expansive and longest exploration of the organic theory of architecture and the Prairie School.[35]
Wright's first commission in Los Angeles, Hollyhock House (built 1918–1921) was intended to be part of an arts colony and live theater complex in East Hollywood, built when the Southern California movie business was taking off. The work of Wright and his young apprentices became a springboard to what became known as California Modernism.[36] The structure's outdoor gardens and interior spaces are integrated.[37]
Built as a summer home in 1935, Fallingwater epitomizes Wright's ideas of organic architecture. Placed over a stream and waterfall, its cantilevered terraces of rock and geometric reinforced concrete spaces blend with the setting's natural rock formations. Wright wanted the couple that commissioned the work to not just look out at the stream on their summer property but "live with the waterfall . . . as an integral part of [their] lives".[38] The American Institute of Architects has called Fallingwater "the best all-time work of American architecture".[39]
Built during the Great Depression, ideas for the Jacobs House (1937) grew out of an urban planning idea of Wright's that would provide a community of well-built, single-family affordable housing. Wright initially called this aesthetic Usonian, a word coined in the early 1900s for "American". Working within a budget of less than $5000, Wright combined his open design plan, functional spaces, and the use of wood, brick, dyed concrete, and large windows, to match a small landscaped neighborhood lot.[40][41]
In 1937 Wright began building his winter home, studio, and architectural fellowship center in the foothills of the Arizona's McDowell Mountains. The property was designed by Wright and his students, and built using timber, locally sourced stone, and a mixed sand concrete. Taliesin West was set within the landscape with overlapping indoor and outdoor rooms, a triangular garden of native plants, and triangular pool.[42]
Wright's work for the Guggenheim Foundation in the 1940s and 1950s re-conceived the modern museum building as a place in conversation with the art within.[24] Placed across from Central Park, the spiral structure incorporates the sinuous forms of nature.[4][43]
↑ Miller, Hugh C. (1973). "Chicago School of Architecture"(PDF). United States Department of the Interior. pp.8–9. Archived(PDF) from the original on January 29, 2023. Retrieved July 12, 2019.
1 2 Allsopp, Phil (Fall 2008). "Preservation, Maintenance Key Funding Priorities for Capital Campaign". Frank Lloyd Wright Quarterly. 19 (4).
↑ Goldstein, Lauren (June 29, 1990). "Taliesin preservation sought". The Capital Times. p.24. Retrieved November 28, 2024– via Newspapers.com.
↑ "World Attention Fallingwater is Commanding a Greater View". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. January 26, 2008. pp.B.6. ProQuest390486630.
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