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a place to post frank lloyd wright thoughts
we done veered off the subject on another thread so i thought out of respect for plantman we could take our discussion of FLW architecture to another place.
i have visited his homes in a number of places. they are scattered around the country. i believe there are 400 or so buildings that he has done. there is a louis sullivan bank in west lafayette with the fabulous terra cotta around the windows in the brick building. it is not very big and i would love to buy it some day. i have no idea if it could be bought though. it has been "modernized" with a dropped ceiling and the inside is pretty much devoid of details. i hope that they may exist above the grid. the biggest concentration of wright buildings is in oak park illinois. there must be at least twelve buildings including his home and studio dating from around 1929 or so and the unity temple, a unitarian church with very striking, unique features. there are a good many homes near his home, all on a walking tour. if you are a fan it is worth a trip. another place with a good group of buildings is Lakeland college in florida. there are at least six or eight buildings there including an administration building and a large chapel (or auditorium). there is also an extensive system of shaded walkways with concrete roof and collonade. that is worth a trip too if you are in the area. i have been there too. and a niece and nephew attended there, recently graduating. for me, a visit to NY and the gugenheim and the empire state building and perhaps the statue of liberty. i probably will skip ground zero because i just think it would be too gut wrenching. tom w
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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC] ..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis. |
#2
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I enjoyed the Guggenheim. There's a FLW house in McCook NB.
Has anyone visited the roofless church in New Harmony IN? Done by the same architect who did the High Museum in Atlanta (I think) but I can't remember his name. It's one of my favorite churches, almost as powerful as Mont St. Michel and it is right across the street from Paul Tillich's grave. I know, thread his already hijacked from FLW to architecture in general.
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1977 300d 70k--sold 08 1985 300TD 185k+ 1984 307d 126k--sold 8/03 1985 409d 65k--sold 06 1984 300SD 315k--daughter's car 1979 300SD 122k--sold 2/11 1999 Fuso FG Expedition Camper 1993 GMC Sierra 6.5 TD 4x4 1982 Bluebird Wanderlodge CAT 3208--Sold 2/13 |
#3
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Tom, if you're going to head East, best to hit Fallingwater first.
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#4
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One of the homes here is a small studio like set up, two other are $500,000 which is a tad above the median home for the neighborhood, the other which was originally built by the Dow's (dow chemical) is huge I am not sure how much it would sell for but it has the watch tower office and many other unique amenities. The community that they are in and where I went to school had a population of less than 5000 at the time so everyone knew about the FLW homes. There are a few (I think 10) more FLW homes but for some reason they don't get the nod from the FLW registry or something, I am not sure what the criteria is to get the official OK from the FLW guys.
A repost but would like to know what exactly makes an official FLW home. |
#5
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Quote:
folks often arent to picky about such little details. (sarcasm) tom w
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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC] ..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis. |
#6
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I know the prints are his just like the four "official" flw homes but I think they needed to be built by a FLW apprentice or something to be "official".
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#7
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Quote:
the two most memorable details which i didnt remember seeing in any books prior to visiting were the rock in the floor in front of the fireplace and the bookended wood veneer on the doors of the continuously built in closet running along the back of the master bedroom area (i think that was where it was). definately worth a trip. i have a picture of my entire family under the house at the waterfall. i guess it must have been fifteen years ago since my youngest was just a babe then. and she is a frosh in college now (studying architecture at bsu as i did). tom w
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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC] ..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis. |
#8
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i see one of them is for sale and it is a friends parents home.
http://www.savewright.org/wright_on_the_market/schaberg/schaberg.html |
#9
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another of my favorite places is thomas jefferson's monticello and his university of virginia campus cental space. very very special. tom w
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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC] ..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis. |
#10
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This is another that is a few doors down from the first house I purchased on my own.
\ http://www.savewright.org/wright_on_the_market/goetsch-winkler/images/gw_kitchen.jpg |
#11
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Fallingwater and Kentuck Knob are near each other. The only things that seem dated in FLW's designs are the small kitchens, and lack of a garage. Some of his furniture wasn't exactly built for comfort either. Kentuck Knob has nice grounds with sculpture gardens if you have the extra time.
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1985 380SE Blue/Blue - 230,000 miles 2012 Subaru Forester 5-speed 2005 Toyota Sienna 2004 Chrysler Sebring convertible 1999 Toyota Tacoma |
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If FLW was the superior engineer that everyone raves about Fallingwater would not have been falling down and had to have millions of dollars in repairs in the last few years. His designs, I am told, were strictly his creations and his customers needs came secondary. Since he was a short person, he designed the interors of his homes to accommodate smaller people. This was all stated in the tour we took through Fallingwater.
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95 SL500 Smoke Silver, Parchment 64K 07 E350 4matic Station Wagon White 34K 02 E320 4Matic Silver/grey 80K 05 F150 Silver 44K |
#13
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I am suprised to see a flw thread without Racine Wisconsin being mentioned. Johnson Wax, Wingspread conference center and several houses.
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1959 Gravely LI, 1963 Gravely L8, 1973 Gravely C12 1982 380SL 1978 450 SEL 6.9 euro restoration at 63% and climbing 1987 300 D 2005 CDI European Delivery 2006 CDI Handed down to daughter 2007 GL CDI. Wifes |
#14
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Quote:
tom w
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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC] ..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis. |
#15
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Quote:
in my experience though, what is said between client and architect makes a big difference in how things go and we will never know what was said, only what we read. history is not always accurate. his buildings often contained groundbreaking ideas that stretched the engineering knowledge of the day. anytime you do this there will be things that fail sooner than what is normal. i have done this on occasion. one time a lawsuit resulted, another time my client understood that part of the adventure included a bit of risk and worked with me to solve the problem and never complained. so today i tend, as most professionals do, to try to keep my pushing of the envelope in the area of forms and functions and use known and proven materials and methods as much as possilble. lawsuits are no fun. i do think though if you never have had one or two you probably have not reached far enough. he had a giant ego, and a creative urge to match. he tried big ideas and succeeded much more than anybody else. his body of work is not matched by any other architect that i know of. i have maybe three hundred built projects but that number includes a fair number of bread and butter hobs where we just provided a service and no creativity was really on the table because the client simply wanted a pole barn or something very functional and so we did it to put bread on the table. i do have maybe 100 that i am proud of for their innovation and design. and the roofs dont leak. and we met the budget so the project was not abandoned. as far as i know flw didnt do any mundane jobs. or at least they arent in any books. as far as him being short, that is true. i am 5' 8. his homes did contain some low spaces...maybe 7'. but they usually also contained tall spaces. he liked to contrast short compact spaces to tall spacious ones so that the impact of the difference was maximized. most architects do this. also remember that folks were shorter then than they are now. a 7' person was almost never seen then. but we have fun and help folks get things built and if it is possible to do some good design in the mix that will be done too. tom w
__________________
[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC] ..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis. |
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