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VOICE ONE:
I’m Phoebe Zimmerman.
VOICE TWO:
And I’m Steve Ember with the VOA Special English program Peoplein America. Today we tell about the life and work of the greatestAmerican building designer of the twentieth century, Frank LloydWright.
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VOICE ONE:
Frank Lloyd Wright designed buildings for more than seventyyears. He did most of his work from Nineteen–Hundred through theNineteen-Fifties. He designed houses, schools, churches, publicbuildings, and office buildings.
Critics say Frank Lloyd Wright wasone of America’s most creative architects. One critic said his ideaswere fifty years ahead of the time in which he lived.
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VOICE TWO:
Frank Lloyd Wright was born in Eighteen–Sixty-Seven in themiddle western state of Wisconsin. He studied engineering at theUniversity of Wisconsin. In Eighteen-Eighty-Seven, he went to thecity of Chicago. He got a job in the office of the famousarchitects, Louis Sullivan and Dankmar Adler.
Several years later, Wright established his own building designbusiness. He began by designing homes for people living in and nearChicago. These homes were called “prairie houses.”
VOICE ONE:
Prairie houses were long and low. They seemed to grow out of theground. They were built of wood and other natural materials. Theindoors expanded to the outdoors by extending the floor. Thiscreated what seemed like a room without walls or a roof.
In Nineteen-Oh-Two, Wright designed one prairie house, called theWillits House, in the town of Highland Park. The house was shapedlike a cross. It was built around a huge fireplace. The rooms weredesigned so they seemed to flow into each other.
VOICE TWO:
Visitors to Chicago can see another of Wright’s prairie houses.It is called the Robie House. It looks like a series of long, lowrooms on different levels. The rooms seem to float over the ground.Wright designed everything in the house, including the furniture andfloor coverings.
Wright’s prairie houses had a great influence on home design inAmerica. Even today, one-hundred-years later, his prairie housesappear very modern.
VOICE ONE:
In the Nineteen-Thirties, Wright developed what he called”Usonian” houses. Usonia was his name for a perfect, democraticUnited States of America. Usonian houses were planned to be lowcost. Wright designed them for the American middle class. These arethe majority of Americans who are neither very rich nor very poor.
Frank Lloyd Wright believed that all middle class families inAmerica should be able to own a house that was designed well. Hebelieved that the United States could not be a true democracy ifpeople did not own their own house on their own piece of land.
VOICE TWO:
Usonian houses were built on a flat base of concrete. The basewas level with the ground. Wright believed that was better and lesscostly than the common method of digging a hole in the ground forthe base. Low-cost houses based on the Usonian idea became verypopular in America in the Nineteen-Fifties. Visitors can see one ofWright’s Usonian homes near Washington, D. C. It is the Pope-LeighyHouse in Alexandria, Virginia.
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VOICE ONE:
Frank Lloyd Wright believed in spreading his ideas to youngbuilding designers. In Nineteen-Thirty-Two, he established a schoolcalled the Taliesin Fellowship. Architectural students paid to liveand work with him.
During the summer, they worked at his home near Spring Green,Wisconsin. Wright called this house “Taliesin.” That is a Welsh namemeaning “shining brow.” It was built of stone and wood into the topof a hill.
During the winter, they worked at Taliesin West. This wasWright’s home and architecture office near Phoenix, Arizona. Wrightand his students started building it in Nineteen-Thirty-Seven in theSonoran Desert.
VOICE TWO:
Taliesin West is an example of Frank Lloyd Wright’s ideas oforganic architecture taking root in the desert. He believed thatarchitecture should have life and spirit. He said a building shouldappear to grow naturally and easily from its base into itssurroundings. Selecting the best place to put a building became amost important first step in the design process.
Frank Lloyd Wright had discovered the beauty of the desert inNineteen-Twenty-Seven when he was asked to help with the design ofthe Arizona Biltmore hotel. He continued to return to the desertwith his students to escape the harsh winters in Wisconsin.
Ten years later he found a perfect place for his winter home andschool. He bought about three-hundred hectares of desert land at thefoot of the McDowell Mountains near Scottsdale, Arizona.
Wright said, ” I was struck by the beauty of the desert, by thedry, clear sun-filled air, by the stark geometry of the mountains.”He wanted everyone who visited Taliesin West to feel this same senseof place.
VOICE ONE:
His architecture students helped him gather rocks and sand fromthe desert floor to use as building materials. They began a seriesof buildings that became home, office and school. Wright keptworking on and changing what he called a building made of manybuildings for twenty years.
Today, Taliesin West has many low stone buildings linked togetherby walkways and courtyards. It is still very much alive withactivity. About seventy people live, work and study there. Guidestake visitors through what is one of America’s most importantcultural treasures.
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In Nineteen-Thirty-Seven, Wright designed a house near the cityof Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It is a fine example of his idea oforganic architecture. The house is called “Fallingwater.” It sits onhuge rocks next to a small river. It extends over a waterfall. Fromone part of the house, a person can step down a stairway over thewater.
“Fallingwater” is so unusual and so beautiful that it came torepresent modern American architecture. One critic calls it thegreatest house of the Twentieth century. Like Taliesin West,”Fallingwater” is open to the public.
VOICE ONE:
Frank Lloyd Wright also is famous for designing imaginativepublic buildings. In Nineteen-Oh-Four, he designed an officebuilding for the Larkin Soap Company in Buffalo, New York. Theoffices were organized around a tall open space. At the top was aglass roof to let sunlight into the center.
In the late Nineteen–Thirties, Wright designed an officebuilding for the Johnson Wax Company in Racine, Wisconsin. It alsohad one great room without traditional walls or windows. The outsideof the building was made of smooth, curved brick and glass.
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VOICE TWO:
In Nineteen-Forty-Three, Frank Lloyd Wright designed one of hismost famous projects: the Guggenheim Museum of Art in New York City.The building was completed in Nineteen-Sixty, the year following hisdeath.
The Guggenheim is unusual because it is a circle. Inside themuseum, a walkway rises in a circle from the lowest floor almost tothe top. Visitors move along this walkway to see the artwork on thewalls.
The Guggenheim museum was very different from Wright’s otherdesigns. It even violated one of his own rules of design: theGuggenheim’s shape is completely different from any of the buildingsaround it.
VOICE ONE:
When Wright was a very old man, he designed the Marin CountyCivic Center in San Rafael, California, near San Francisco. TheCivic Center project was one of his most imaginative designs. It isa series of long buildings between two hills.
Frank Lloyd Wright believed that architecture is life itselftaking form. “Therefore,” he said, “it is the truest record of lifeas it was lived in the world yesterday, as it is lived today, orever will be lived.”
Frank Lloyd Wright died in Nineteen-Fifty-Nine, in Phoenix,Arizona. He was ninety-one years old. His buildings remain a recordof the best of American Twentieth Century culture.
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VOICE TWO:
This Special English program was written by Shelley Gollust andMarilyn Christiano. It was produced by Lawan Davis. Our studioengineer was Max Carroll. I’m Steve Ember.
VOICE ONE:
And I’m Phoebe Zimmerman. Join us again next week for anotherPeople in America program on the Voice of America.