Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright

Arguably the best known architect in American history, Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959) worked most frequently and successfully in residential architecture but studied, lectured, and designed in all realms of architecture throughout a long career. His contributions to architecture and urban design include the Prairie and Usonian styles, Broadacre City, numerous publications, and many other innovations in design in residential architecture (Wright, 2008).

Frank lloyd wright (was perhaps the most celebrated U.S. architect and designer, famous for his original concept of houses built in harmony with nature. In the 1930s, Wright defined his concept of “organic architecture” as a respectful interaction and simple reinterpretation of nature, instead of a mere reproduction of it. For instance, natural materials like wood or stone used in houses should look as such, without being transformed or painted. Wright often declared, “Form and function are one,” which means, for instance, that a museum should look like a museum and not like a Greek temple (Storrer, 2007).

Among many notable buildings, Wright's Fallingwater in the Laurel Highlands of southwest Pennsylvania illustrates his ecological approach to architecture: In this case, a unique house built in 1939 on a cascade that goes inside the building and crosses the living room. This synthesis of the architecture with the environment is not just decorative; it is the symbol of the integration of nature that feeds the harmony of the life style, the furnishings, and the indoor design. In this case, instead of having a nice view of the outside waterfalls though a window, inhabitants lived in a house that rose over the unchanged cascade. Unlike some of Wright's projects, Fallingwater, also known as the Edgar J. Kaufmann House, still remains with its original furnishings; it has been open to visitors since the Kaufmann family left it in 1964 (Wright, 2008).

Between 1900 and 1919, Wright also introduced the Prairie style, which was later known as the Prairie School, a design approach that was shared with other U.S. architects and followers. Instead of building houses that looked like boxes, the Prairie style favored unity, open plans, and low, horizontal lines that would seem to blend with the flat landscape, with broad open spaces instead of a group of strictly defined rooms. Perhaps influenced by his trip to Japan in 1916, Wright wanted to design every house as a unified environment in which the interior would be coherent with the natural landscape instead ...