Friday, April 13, 2012

Wingspread

Lazy blogger that I am, I have enlisted my resident architect to provide us with text for this post. He is after all the expert. We are just back from a trip to Wisconsin where we visited Frank Lloyd Wright's Wingspread and a number of other Frank Lloyd Wright houses.


Here's Wingspread from above. We were given an in-depth private tour of Wingspread and left to wander around and take pictures for as long as we wanted.


Here's what the architect who steals my covers has to say about it:

Frank Lloyd Wright was definitely flying high in 1937 when he designed Wingspread, the +/- 14,000 SF home for Herbert Johnson, president of S.C. Johnson & Son.  Only a few years earlier, Wright was largely forgotten by the architecture world - some even thought he had died - his commissions having dried up after the 1915-1923 Imperial Hotel project (see earlier post), the result of personal scandals and society’s tastemakers rejecting the Prairie Style that Wright had championed starting in 1893.


One project had given life to the second great phase of Wright’s career, Fallingwater, the iconic 1935 country house that catapulted him to the cover of Life magazine and world-wide fame.  Over the next two years, he would create the first Usonian house (the Jacob’s residence), his own incredible desert home and studio at Taliesin West, and the stunning headquarters for Johnson Wax in Racine, Wisconsin.  The next 20 years were the most prolific period of his career, with more than 200 of Wright’s designs constructed.

During the construction of the headquarters, Johnson hired Wright to design him a new home on a large tract of land north of Racine.  A ‘zoned’ plan, four wings containing different private functions- master suite, children’s bedrooms, guest bedrooms/garage, and kitchen/service- extend into the landscape from a central 3-story great hall with living, dining, library and music areas spiraling around a chimney mass with five fireplaces.   
Wingspread - Great Hall

Wingspread - Great Hall

While the name Wingspread was derived from this layout, the glass cupola of the house also provided a location for the Johnson children to watch their father do fly-bys piloting his private plane. 

View from cupola
Spiral stairs to cupola

Many of Wright’s projects had wing-like roof or balcony projections seeming to defy gravity, but The Spring Green restaurant actually used steel trusses from the flight deck of a decommissioned aircraft carrier to allow the building to span a small ravine.  It is currently used as the visitor’s center for Wright’s original Wisconsin home, Taliesin, located nearby.    
Spring Green
Fly on over to Sepia Saturday to look at more views on flight.

23 comments:

  1. How wonderful! I will do this too someday! Recently I have been going around town here in Minneapolis taking pictures of some of his houses here! He was an amazing man! For the most part....I still am in shock about (well you know some of his real life drama!) But he was talented where it counts right!

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  2. Wingspread is a HOUSE? Truly how the other half lives.

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  3. Wow! This is wonderful; thanks for the info and pictures; I really enjoyed this one Christine.

    Kathy M.

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  4. Kristin,
    And despite the size of the house, the bedrooms were quite small. These were the Johnsons of S.C. Johnson, makers of Johnson Wax, Ziploc bags, Windex, Pledge, Off, Shout, Drano etc., so yes, they are definitely the other half.The family donated this house for use as a conference center for the Johnson Foundation though, so no one lives there anymore.

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  5. Fascinating photos and history lesson! I love Wright's designs, but I can't help thinking about how much time it would take to clean such a house, and how much money to maintain it. ;p

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  6. Debbie-
    Fortunately for the Johnson's, the 'service wing also contained servants quarters, so cleaning the joint was not an issue for them... Nor was the cost of maintaining it- and Wright designs are notorious for maintenance issues- since the family was extremely wealthy, but clients of lesser means often faced challenges with upkeep of their structures.

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  7. Christine, you took a different flight, a very interesting one. Grand houses to explore and their history; wonderful.

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  8. No problem cleaning the place. They had all the wax they could possibly use!

    Great post. I loved the way you wove flight into it.
    Nancy

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  9. A truly tremendous post. Ihad not heard of Wingspread before - that's some place as a house or as a conference centre; and an appropriate name for our our flight theme.

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  10. Great post Christine, a fascinating look inside, especially that great hall.

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  11. Wonderful take on the theme. I attended a conference at Wingspread when I worked at the Ford Foundation long ago. A gentle snow fell outside the picture window that surrounded most of the meeting room. Magical.

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  12. Wright's contributions were covered in my Art History course in college, but I don't ever recall hearing of or seeing Wingspread. What an amazing house to grow up in.

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  13. So Nice To Visit Somewhere that encourages photography.So often I visit places that discourage cameras.Lovely,Bold, Architecture.

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  14. I love Frank Lloyd Wright's architecture, and the concept of a separate wing for the children is genius.

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  15. I love his houses, but I don't know whether I would like living in one. Wingspread looks like it is more suitable for a conference center than a home.

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  16. Two things : it is a fascinating post, full of descriptions and images that make me want to know more and make me want to visit the actual house (which makes it blogging at its best). Secondly it is a perfect illustration of taking a theme and twisting it in a creative way. Bravo to you and the architect.

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  17. That house is fantastic, though I’m not sure I’d have actually liked to live there. The Johnson’s Wax people - they were slippery customers weren’t they? :)

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  18. I love Wright's works.
    They remain pertinent architecturally and pleasing to the eye.
    Thanx 4 sharing!!
    :)~
    HUGZ

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  19. Have been to Wingspread about 3 years ago and never took any photos so this was perfect. And how you worked it into flight is perfect. A great post with great photos.

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  20. Oh, if only half the buildings being built today showed a glimmer of his genius instead of the cold glass boxes that abound.

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  21. This is wonderful, Christine! It brings back fond memories for me. I grew up in Chicago and remember visiting a few Wright-designed buildings in the area, including (if memory serves) his residence in Oak Park. Wow! I was mesmerized & fell in love with his work. My husband isn't much of an art aficionado, but he's always enjoyed Wright's designs.

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  22. An interesting place, and very different from the mansions typical of earlier designers. I know from personal experience though that nothing gets built without changes from the original plan. I wonder how much this "house" was altered as builders applied practical experience to an architect's blueprint.

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  23. Mike-
    Wright typically had an apprentice on site during the construction of projects to assist contractors with areas that needed additional clarification or revisions, as there was often insufficient information on the original prints to cover all the detailing or atypical construction techniques Wright was exploring. He also used trusted master builders on multiple projects when possible- at Wingspread it was Ben Wiltscheck, who was the contractor for The Johnson Wax headquarters, and therefore well prepared for dealing with Wright's notoriously challenging projects. Builders/clients didn't just make changes to a Wright design on a whim though, unless they were interested in suffering the wrath of Wright's equally challenging personality, which sometimes resulted in him disowning projects.

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