How Frank Lloyd Wright Changed America
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 17 апр 2024
- Use code stewarthicks at the link below to get an exclusive 60% off an annual Incogni plan: incogni.com/stewarthicks
_Special Thanks_
+ Evan Montgomery -- Coproduction and editing
+ Society of Architectural Historians (www.sah.org)-- filming at the Charnley Persky House
+ Allison Newmeyer -- 3D modeling of the Unity Chapel
_Description_
From a young boy playing with blocks to becoming one of the most revered architects in history, Frank Lloyd Wright's journey is one of creativity, opportunity, and adaptability. Early experiences with geometric patterns and design principles laid the groundwork for an incredible career, challenging the notion that his skills were merely innate rather than cultivated through experiences and serendipitous opportunities.
This video traces the career of Frank Lloyd Wright in an attempt to dispel the traditional narrative that he was simply a singular genius. Rather, his ability to leverage economic and social shifts, especially in architectural practices, set him apart and propelled him into the cultural figure we know today.
_Membership_
Join this channel to get access to perks:
/ @stewarthicks
_About the Channel_
Architecture with Stewart is a RUclips journey exploring architecture’s deep and enduring stories in all their bewildering glory. Weekly videos and occasional live events breakdown a wide range of topics related to the built environment in order to increase their general understanding and advocate their importance in shaping the world we inhabit.
_About Me_
Stewart Hicks is an architectural design educator that leads studios and lecture courses as an Associate Professor in the School of Architecture at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He also serves as an Associate Dean in the College of Architecture, Design, and the Arts and is the co-founder of the practice Design With Company. His work has earned awards such as the Architecture Record Design Vanguard Award or the Young Architect’s Forum Award and has been featured in exhibitions such as the Chicago Architecture Biennial and Design Miami, as well as at the V&A Museum and Tate Modern in London. His writings can be found in the co-authored book Misguided Tactics for Propriety Calibration, published with the Graham Foundation, as well as essays in MONU magazine, the AIA Journal Manifest, Log, bracket, and the guest-edited issue of MAS Context on the topic of character architecture.
_Contact_
FOLLOW me on instagram: @stewart_hicks & @designwithco
Design With Company: designwith.co
University of Illinois at Chicago School of Architecture: arch.uic.edu/
_Special Thanks_
Stock video and imagery provided by Getty Images, Storyblocks, and Shutterstock.
Music provided by Epidemic Sound
#architecture #urbandesign
![Natanael Cano - Ya Te Olvidé [Official Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/xLig8I91SJQ/mqdefault.jpg)
Great video Stewart, I’ve wandered around and toured as many Wright buildings as I could get too and were open to the public. I do love his quote “Early in life I had to choose between honest arrogance and hypocritical humility. I chose honest arrogance and have seen no occasion to change”.
my mum designed a home based on frank llyod wright book it was a gorgeous and unusual house we grew up in the 70's and was a home for our family for 40 plus years - nestled into the environment (Australian bush)
Ha! My dad was a forester and he used to bring home wood samples for me to play with. I never pursued a career in architecture, but maybe playing with those blocks nurtured my fascination with architecture. Thank you for your excellent videos!
5:12 Topic Suggestion: This is a topic that would make a great video on its own - rebuilding a city after a war or natural disaster.
I would love to hear that
Also, he designed Marge's hairdo, just as Apu Nahasapeemapetilon once sang: "Maggie with her eyes so bright, Marge with hair by Frank Lloyd Wright."
Frank Lloyd Wright appeared on a 1956 episode of What's My Line. He wasn't technically the mystery guest-that was Liberace. However, the panel was blindfolded while they asked yes or no questions to try to identify his occupation/identity. That episode, like all the surviving episodes of WML, is available here on RUclips. WML aired on Sunday nights on CBS from 1950 until 1967. I wasn't born until 1968, but about 20 years ago, I came across the show airing on the Game Show Network at 3 AM. I really enjoyed it and began recording the show on my DVR. There is quite a lot to like about the show, but every once in a while, they would have an exceptionally interesting contestant, exceptionally interesting to modern eyes. For instance, they had an episode with Colonel Harland Sanders. But because he wasn't yet the face of a national ad campaign for KFC, the panel didn't need to be blindfolded. Thomas Eagleton, who was then the DA of St. Louis, Missouri, was a contestant. He would go on to be nominated as George McGovern's running mate in 1972 but would withdraw when the press discovered that in the 1960s, Eagleton had been hospitalized and received electroshock therapy for depression. Of course, plenty of Hollywood movie stars appeared as mystery guests, including one future president. Ronald Reagan appeared as a mystery guest in 1953 and as a guest panelist in 1956.
I love Wrights work and think he's brilliant. Another factor which helped him immensely were all of his patrons, many of whom he strung along for money, one whose wife he sorta stole, and most who let him do designs with little oversight. This let him explore his ideas sometimes without the consequences of having to deal with buildings failing, falling apart, leaking, or fitting a program set by his clients that current architects would be in big trouble for.
Yes, it is not enough to be a brilliant architect. One has to be able to communicate the brilliance of one’s architecture. As can be seen in many of the comments, many people have a strong dislike for Frank Loyd Wright’s architecture. Interestingly, most of them don’t say why with any specificity.
@@barryrobbins7694 His ability to be a self promoter was pretty legendary as was his confident communication of his ideas.
@@benmarshall5984 I agree.
@@benmarshall5984 Apparently FLW never got a chance to speak to many of the commentators.😀
Why is everyone shoving each other out of the way to see who can best deep throat FLW? It's disgusting to watch.
Silicon caulk is the unsung hero of Frank Lloyd Wright's story. All his building leaked like sieves before Dow Corning's wonder material fixed his mess.
A proper architect is ALWAYS ahead of the materials.
And no owner of any Wright home ever complained about a leak.
Basically, your comment shows how little you know, and how poorly able you are to assess architectural design.
@@Chris.Davies 😂
@@Chris.Davies wow.... just.... wow......
@@Chris.Davies Nah. I used to do my architect student roommate's drafting homework (before CAD), made parts of his models. Architects can be an odd bunch. Practical would be great, but... The annex to Falling Water is there because the main room was impossible to heat. All the Modern houses of Mies van der Rohe, The Case Study Houses, Schindler,, etc... ALL leaked, (Along the bottoms of the wall windows was chronic.) They were all nearly impossible to heat/air condition. I've been in several, known people who built them, worked on them. They were far ahead of the materials. Only in the past 40 years have there been windows insulated well enough to make those houses practical.
Great architecture is first and foremost visual and spatial. I'm sure Wrights bungalow houses in Chicago which were variations on the more conventional upper class domestic architecture of the day were every bit as practical. When his style advanced, he was ahead of the materials. The Ennis House in Los Angeles is crumbling because decomposing granite isn't a good aggregate material. It is such a beautiful house that it's well worth the decades of repairs and searching for new binders to make it work.
Caulking when Wright started would be putty (linseed oil and marble dust); oakum, tar and lead; or 'shingling, to shed water.' We now have caulks used on boats that make silicone seem primitive.
@@Chris.Davies dumb reply. a proper architect works within the confines of budget, weather, the site, etc. great talent. terrible person. he steam rolled so many people. he ate up poor Peters who kept many of his designs from collapsing. take the FL Wright walking tour in Oak Park. his own home, which he remodeled over and over, is a delight.
Each video is as professional as if it was filmed by the BBC.
Your channel has helped me to finally make the trip to appreciate Chicago's architecture in person, I fly out from Philadelphia on Tuesday. So excited, thank you for your great videos!
I worked downtown on Jackson and wells right by the sears tower.2 of my favorite architectural buildings are so close by the rookery And the monad mac And the monadnock building
I hope you have a chance to see them both
Everybody loves mayor daily from the 70s But man he let's so many buildings that were historical get torn down for no reason (money)
There should be so many beautiful buildings left there
I wanted to be the next Frank Lloyd Wright when I was younger, but I ended up being Frank Lloyd _Wrong_
RUclips community policy finds your attempt at architectural pun to violate our user guidelines. Try harder.
I tried to go the Frank Lloyd Wright direction too, but I accidentally took a Frank Lloyd Left.
Ooh, too bad! Looks like Frank Lloyd Wright was Frank Lloyd Wstoopid!
Saaaaaame
You need to be PUNished for that one
When talking about Wright and the Froebel blocks, it would be a good idea to also show a few pages from a popular 19th century architectural reference book that talks about the use of a grid system to line up structural elements and to provide good proportions. The grid is recommended for use in both horizontal, and vertical, planes. The book is, Encyclopedia of Architecture: The Complete Guide to Architecture, from Antiquity to the Nineteenth Century. It was written by Joseph Gwilt, and published in 1867.
I would say that the odds are extremely good to 100%, that a young guy like Wright who was interested in learning about architecture would at least glance through the books in the libraries of the architects he worked for. If Wright's eyes ever ran across the pages in Gwilt's book that cover the grid system, his Froebel block molded mind would latch onto that like a pit bull. And even if Wright never saw Gwilt's book, he worked in a firm that almost invented steel girder skyscrapers, and they were, and still are, distributed on a grid. And it's likely that Gwilt's book was known to both Adler and Sullivan. Finally, Wright was exposed to traditional Japanese house design, which also has a grid system incorporated into it. The result was that he used grids in his work. He used them silently to guide him in his design decisions. But he also used them more overtly, even having masons score a grid on the concrete floors of many of his buildings.
A couple of questions remain, what proportioning system was shown in Gwilt's book? And what system did Wright employ? Gwilt did NOT specify a proportioning system, but the illustrations in his book show Fibonacci proportions without naming Fibonacci. And, Wright's plans show Fibonacci proportions of, 1:2, 2:3, 3:5, 5:8, 8:13, etc.
Every skilled designer needs to master MANY other important factors involved in design, proportion is just one of them. But, when Froebel is mentioned in relation to Wright, it is probably a good idea to also mention Gwilt, and Fibonacci.
This video was so good!
I’m not an architect, so I’m aware my opinion is uneducated and probably wrong in eyes of most, but although Wright was an uncontested genius ahead of his time, I cannot help but feeling overwhelmed every time I look at one of his designs, his personal home & studio in particular. It gives me vibes of something you’d see in a horror movie. All of his buildings and houses give the impression of being dark, oppressive, claustrophobic, stuffy, sprawled, inefficient and excessively heavy. It feels as if he were in control all the time by not allowing you to look into, by limiting what you can see out of, by compressing you at the entrance just to release you into dimly lit environments full of heavy furniture and ornaments. Then there is the SC Johnson HQ where the manager’s officers are on a raised level so that they could surveil the lesser employees from above, reinforcing who held the power. Is all very sinister and oppressive to me and I wouldn’t like to be inside one of his creations.
Interesting comment. I love most of Wright's architecture but I agree with you about the horror movie vibe. To me his work is beautiful and elegant but also austere and authoritarian. And as we know the houses were cold and damp. I hadn't realised before that he had no official training, especially in construction. His experimentation was not guided by knowledge. But for all that he was a great architect.
Thanks!
Thank you!!
Excellent content, Stewart. Wright's level of thoughtfulness and consideration for construction technique and human psychology are very inspiring to me and my practice 🤘
I was so happy that you covered the Japanese influence with unity temple, I did a case study on the temple for one of my ARCH classes at College of DuPage and when I was trying to find plans I came across an image of the two plans side by side. After a brief deep dive I was shocked with how similar the buildings were on the plans and overall. Great video, I always enjoy your work
The long repetitive bleak grid layout of the suburbs is nothing to be proud of.
I'm sure he wouldn't be proud of how his ideas were twisted into the current suburban landscape.
What is touched upon in this video and bears further discussion is how his architecture was of a certain time and place. It is the stuff of the Midwest or the west coast; born of the automobile era. So lateral buildings built across what would be sprawling properties are where it is best suited. These are neighbourhoods where everyone drives and where walking is impractical. It did not fit so well in urban environments.
(I bristle against FLW or anyone, really-Steve Jobs, etc-being declared some godlike, always-right solution to the human condition. He was a brilliant man with a lot of great ideas, and yes, there’s much to learn there. But simply copying his work, inconsiderately stamping it across the landscape, well, it’s what led to things like endless tracts of suburbia, traffic jams and strip malls.)
In addition to making a lot of toxic ideas trendy, a lot of Wright's buildings kind of sucked.
Fallingwater nearly collapsed in the 90s because, as it turns out, Wright did not know how to build his famous cantilevers.
I bet a lot of his popularity is directly attributable to that last thing mentioned in the video: being better than his peers at spreading his ideas to the next generation.
@@TheRealE.B. there’s something to that. Until and perhaps even since then, there’s not been another American architect so singularly attached to a residential housing style. Also, I think he was lucky: he was in the right place at the right time in history. In booming post-WWII America, people had little interest in historic architecture. The burgeoning middle class, emerging from WWII and depression-era austerity, wanted to leave the past behind and embrace something fresh and new. And there he was. It may very well have been that anything new (well, not anything, but anything decent, let’s say) would have been embraced with similar vigor.
Anyone know the woodblock print at 8:03 please?
Love it ❤
Wright was said to have visited the Japanese village that was part of the Chicago worlds fair, almost daily
I'm not an architect but I've been to the Samara house and also the John E Christian house, both in West Lafayette IN. It's like you're witnessing a work of art, it's palpable. There's something about masterful work I suppose, it just speaks for itself.
I went to Purdue and walked by the flw house near the stadium many times. It was a beaut.
The Sydney suburb of Castlecrag has several homes by Marion Mahony Griffin, as she and Walter Burley Griffin lived there in a Bohemian community while overseeing the construction of Canberra. They moved to Lucknow, India, where Walter died. I have been inside one of those homes and it is sublime, although costly to maintain the aging concrete.
I've long been fascinated by the story of Canberra. It's quite a saga
It's an historical injustice that Walter Burley Griffin is generally credited (solely) with master-planning Canberra, when it's clear that Walter and Marion very much operated organically as a creative (as well as marital) partnership.
I always thought of Frank Lloyd Wright's works to be for pretentious people, but after watching this video (I didn't looked much into his biography before) I can't feel but respect for him because he would probably loved all of the attention he got, and will get overtime because of his timeless contributions to architecture.
My grandfather was apprenticed to Alphonso Illaneilli. It would be awesome to hear about some of those artists behind the artist!
I was prepping for a Skillshare ad read this whole time!
Great video! I've been reading a lot about FLW lately and one of the more interesting things I came across was the warehouse he built in his hometown (Richland Center). It still stands, although it's heavily under-utilized at the moment. It's called the AD German Warehouse and if you look for a picture of it you'll see it could only have been designed by FLW.
Really cool building.
Seems to me as a clutter of styles and materials , proportionally unbalanced, in all sense
I thought George Costanza designed the Guggenheim 😂
No, just the new addition to it 😂
I thought Art Vandelay designed it.😀
Cool to see you in the Charnley house foyer
Camera click sound bytes are stupidly out of place, unnecessary and annoying!!!
But how is FLW relevant today? Indeed he is, and some time might have been spent specifically on that. Thank you for this video. It is a very good one.
If that story about his mother giving him blocks is not apocryphal, its incredible parenting.
I've always been a little skeptical of that block story. I think as architects we tend to embellish the truth for the sake of the bold. And that's okay lol
1:50 aux contraire, we have to draw a straight Line. We are talking about Architecture after all.
Wright has an amazing house in the Phoenix, AZ area
When I look at the rigid structure at Frank Lloyd Wright imposed on his residences, I have to wonder at the pleasure of owning the place. The Guggenheim does not offer a variety of display settings, they are all diagonally placed on the ramp. The Kaleta Humphries theater in Dallas, Texas has windows in the back of the auditorium that require a little wooden panels to close off for productions done in the daytime and it has a set of stairs to the balcony that are small and angled, and since they were provided with carpet to deaden the sound, they are really tricky to walk up. The actual stage space requires accommodation to the architect and has very limited backstage support.
It's hard to think of a bad FLLW building although, like Lutyens, he paid little mind to budgets.
Great work!
Now do le Corbusier, then compare and contrast...
Wright is a great example of a great contratian
Naturally he needed the opportunities and encouragement, but in my experience, those mean nothing without the right person getting them.
The Malcolm gladwell reference in a FLW video is *chefs kiss* 👨🍳🤌
Uh, a Gladwell reference is not a good sign at all, he is not a serious or reliable source for anything and I am frankly shocked to see Stewart name check him here.
Though I'm as much of a fan as most people are, FLW's single greatest accomplishment was inspiring his most prolific student, Alden B. Dow.
YOU NEVER MENTIONED LEVIT VILL LIKE THE COMPANY THAT MANUFACTURED ALL THE ELECTRICAL CONNECTIONS WE USE IN HOUSES TO THIS DAY LEVET
John Lautner: Hold My Beer!
Excellent video! My first exposure to Frank Lloyd Wright was through the Guggenheim (and Simon & Garfunkel's song about Frank Lloyd Wright). My dad would take my brother and me out on Sunday afternoons, and we often went to museums. We didn't go to the Geggenheim very often because the admission price was very steep, but every once in a while we ended up there. I found the quality of space amazing. At the bottom it felt like we were at the bottom of a narrow cylinder, but when we took the elevator to the top, we entered this very open, expansive space, light-filled space with a giant hole in the middle. As we made our way down the ramp the space would gradually constrict until we reached the bottom, and then we were at the bottom of a hole again. I was far more interested in the space than in the art displayed there, to which I paid no attention. That perhaps highlights one of the criticisms of the Guggenheim: the building itself overwhelmed the art within.
However, the first time I was really WOWED by a Frank Lloyd Wright interior was when I first visited the 1914-16 Francis W Little living room as installed in the American Wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, sometime around 1985. After going through period rooms from the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, all of which were interesting in their own ways, I entered the Frank Lloyd Wright space. What a revelation! What a contrast! The room was expansive, yet serene, in the way of Zen Buddhist temple is serene. I felt myself relax, physically and emotionally, into that room. I wanted to live in a space like that. My only frustration was that it was only a fragment of the building outside of its original context. Of course, I've seen many FLW buildings since, like Unity Temple, Fallingwater, Taliesin in Wisconsin, and various Usonian houses, and I knew what to expect, but my first visit to the Little House livingroom is still one of the most architecturally powerful experiences I've ever had.
great talent. terrible person. he steam rolled so many people. he ate up poor Peters who kept many of his designs from collapsing. take the FL Wright walking tour in Oak Park. his own home, which he remodeled over and over, is a delight.
Success is the combination of talent and opportunity!
I will say when I was about 8 one of the only channels we could get in the mountains was PBS and I saw a special about the Falling Water and that's when I was hooked.
I was worried this was going to be another "dunking on" video.
The Frank Lloyd Wright designed Marin County Civic Center, about 20 minutes north of San Francisco, is an eyesore.
So much so, that's it's an attack on beauty.
Strange roof, I'll give you that.
And what exactly is your idea of beauty in a building?
Indeed.
He reminds me of Patti Smith, and other artists, one is told to like by self-professed experts, and those "in the know".
Sorry, traditional building throughout Europe, and many in NYC, San Fran, and more,
...embrace beauty, rather than attack it.
Æsthetics can be so personal. But shitposting bad opinions is fun, right?
Thanks for pointing to the Civic Center. I had not heard of it before. I think the building is beautiful and inspiring. I guess it appeared dated rather than historical when you were younger and you've never gotten over it.
The wood block thumbnail was way more intriguing.
Imagine being the guy that gave Wright the “it’s you or me” ultimatum in 1893. Oops.
Not sat all oops. Louis Sullivan was and remains leagues ahead of Wright.
@@kkelly9424. He may be - subjectively - but Wright is far more well known among the public at large.
❤
You’re the quintessential architecture teacher from a Chicago. Louis Sullivan, Frank Lloyd Wright, Meis van der Rohe, and SOM FTW.
Validation first, I'm not a fan of FLW other than his "big picture" aesthetics. He did, most certainly, have an eye for balance and design, but the beauty of it, at best, is subjective. FLW also was the Grandfather of the "MacMansion," and what he did with OPC cementitious materials (one of the worst polluters in the world today) is a blight on architecture and a never-ending battle to keep his architecture even functional as it (very successfully) falls apart. I've worked on Falling Waters, and know many of his projects on a "hands-on" basis. Each is a collection of good aesthetic design but horrid material choices and decisions that even tradespeople and craftspeople at the time told him were bad, which led to him having many leave projects leaving him with those that would capitulate to his ironic demands that we suffer with today in restoration of such work. As a natural and traditional design builder, historic restorationist, and someone who appreciates architecture deeply I can admire some of FLW's work astheticly; however, the legacy of "track homes," sprawling subdivisions, and poor material use is not to be admired at all...
I live in southern Wisconsin. Wright buildings have two things in common: Cracked foundations and leaky roofs.
Only people who have been forced to occupy a Wright building have rights to comment. The Lillypad Office was pure Hell for those secretaries. Most Chicago homeowners try to escape after two years. The Wright warehouse in Richland Center has been vacant for a couple decades, with locals wanting it razed immediately.
The genius of Frank Lloyd Wright is that his buildings are striking, inside and out, and that they photograph really well. They look great. I can see why architects like them. Having been inside the Dana -Thomas house in Springfield, lllinois, however, I'm honestly more interested in the opinions of people who've had to actually live in them. Everybody talks about what the buildings look like. Unfortunately, nobody talks about what it's like to have deal with them on a daily basis.
I am prepared to admit that taking a brief tour of the house is not enough to make me an expert. I also admit that that my view of the house is not the view of the house that a resident would have gotten when the house was new. Nor do I have a good view of the house in its historical context; it's possible that contemporary houses were worse. Nevertheless, I have my doubts. I've been in even older houses that seemed much more pleasant.
great talent. terrible person. he steam rolled so many people. he ate up poor Peters who kept many of his designs from collapsing. take the FL Wright walking tour in Oak Park. his own home, which he remodeled over and over, is a delight.
3:36 Unitarian* Minister
I feel like nowadays his lack of formal education would become a humongous problem and drama later on. Wouldn't matter if everything was well within regulations.
FLW only fault was the size of a lot of his houses (with the exception of all his earlier builds). Overall, his Usonian houses were too anemic in size., especially the main living room. There were exceptions like Kentucky Nob and a few others but even those could have been bigger. Overall he was a genius when it came to how he defined volume in his later homes - they just need to be bigger.
I think most of that how much larger houses are now, it used to be that a family house would be 1,177 in 1940 now most houses have nearly doubled in size to 2,014. It’s more a sign of how culture and architecture has changed not a fault of FLW.
@@Pisolithus I am sorry but FLW thought too small, so I disagree.
Another major factor toward his success: favorable economic conditions and a very strong middle class with well paid and talented tradesmen.
Wright's ability to manipulate three dimensions in his head is no less impressive than Mozart's ability to manipulate musical ideas in his. Wright fully designed Falling Water in his mind and drew it on paper in a single session. Yes, all those other things were necessary steps along the way, but without his special ability he could not have been what he was: one of America's greatest artists.
Informative and entertaining. Excellent work as usual.
70% was his work, but 30% was his self promotion. After all Rule #1 at being ‘successful’ in great Art & Design is not the work itself but who you know that can get your work out there, whether you’re a Designer, Writer, Painter or Musician
I hate the Guggenheim. The art hung on the main walls can't be straight because the floor isn't. I also resent that he never acknowledged the influence of Mackintosh on his work.
A movie about his life would be awesome! I see Leonardo DiCaprio playing the part.
He studied under Alan Conover? From "Alan Ruins Everything"?
I know about FLW I read Endymion.
It’s a shame that we live in an era where we have to tamper down our knowledge that wright was an amazing genius. Reminds me of the kurt vonnegut short story harrison Bergeron. Because we reward mediocrity now, doesn’t mean we can’t celebrate genius
IMOP his talents were space, looks and feel.
Beautifully made with fresh perspectives, thanks
I am interacting with the content
Would love to see a video about how his buildings work.
Talking about the layouts and the tricks to improve the experience.
10:48 The word "Usonian" struck me as interesting. Bears a striking similarity to the Esperanto word for the USA, which is "Usono". Looked it up and apparently both Wright and the author of Esperanto were influenced by an early 20th century author who advocated to use the name Usonia for the US. Only caught on in Esperanto I guess!
My favorite architect!
He work out human architecture in a downward trajectory
The Architecture that destroys the soul
I like your contet only because i like arcitekture. Keep up the good work you do.
FLW seems to have been more of an artist than architect, with buildings as his medium rather than canvas or clay. I've visited Taliesin in Wisconsin and the Dana-Thomas house in Illinois. I loved both of them. The spaces he created are truly wonderful to experience. The variation of sight angles, lighting, colors, textures, compression/release spacing, etc make you feel like there is always something new and beautiful to discover and explore. But I honestly can't imagine anyone living in either of the houses. It's hard to explain, but it doesn't seem like the houses were created to feel like a home, but more like they were created to be looked at and admired in and of themselves, rather than creating spaces for security, comfort, and relationship.
This is similar to my experience of the Dana Thomas house. It looks great from the outside. The interior decor, when considered on a piece-by-piece basis, is amazing. But it also seems like a horrible place to live. The layout is baffling and the most pleasant rooms in the whole place are the strictly functional places like the kitchen. I'm honestly not sure how much of what I dislike about the house is due to Wright, how much is due to the woman who commissioned it, and how much is due to the constraints of the time in which it was built, but the combined effect is unpleasant.
I've toured Fallingwater, and... I wasn't impressed. It didn't seem like it would work as a house to live in. I can't remember all the details but as I recall, the commode was ridiculously low to the ground and I would have struggled mightily to use it. I'm an EE by training and to me, form follows function. (This includes HMI functions, too.) I feel like the functions of these buildings came a distant second to how pretty they looked on Kodachrome.
Just one technology he missed out on was modern insulation and thermal breaks. All that cantilevered concrete brrrr.
i didn't know Frank Lloyd Wright invented the box.
Well Done!
Probably the greatest architect of all time; past, present, and future.
No architect will even begin to approach his success, or his skill, or the number of completed projects.
Thank you for this excellent review of FLW. I've spent a lot of time in various FLW homes, mostly Wingspread when I was a young musician. I loved that home/community center. I can say that, for me, FLWs homes are fun. They're fun to explore. I've also spent time in his grandparent's farm home in Spring Green, WI and both Talieson and Talieson West. The one negative thing I've heard about his homes is that they require a lot of expensive work to keep them in good condition.
All comments below fall in two catagories:
People who love FLW's artistic style and flair,
Or people who hate FLW's disregard of practicality and functionality.
These should be held in balance with the audience in mind, a good architect would balance both beauty and functionality thereby magnifying the total work. Buildings can be both beautiful and functional. But FLW was good at publicity it seems and because his work was so striking, it gained recognition. If the public at large had the opportunity to live in a FLW building, I doubt his fame would be as great. Yet FLW didn't design buildings with balance in mind. They were designed to be good at one or two things because that was what the audience wanted. What has actually happened is the audience has changed and is blaming FLW for not reaching from the grave to change his work for them.
FLW's buildings are like the architectural equivalent of super cars. They are beautiful, amazing, and really good at doing one or two things, but to live with one is certainly a pain. Yet everyone wants one. Someday the audience will change and super cars may no longer be appreciated the same way. And that's ok.
I just noticed your channel logo.
Good Lord. 👏 Maybe I'm late to the party, but this is sooo good.
10:30 Those one-acre lots!
Love this overview!
"Malcolm Gladwell" *stops video*
Yeap
Thank you, Stewart for this video. Frank Lloyd Wright is my favorite architect. I like the computer generated models. Are you going to do additonal videos with building models like the ones featured in prior videos? It would be cool to see more.
*laughs in drainage*
Yeah, was a bit surprised at how one-sided Stewart was in this video, Wright's buildings were certainly beautiful but in terms of quality were/are absolute nightmares.
Did you know that the author Ekizabeth Enright was his niece?
This was a great episode, thank you! I have heard his name here and there but never known much about the man or his specific style of architecture. This was a perfect primer and im definitely about to go down a rabbit hole!
I appreciate your efforts, thank you for the high quality content.
MY JAPANESE GRANDFATHER GRADUATED AT THE VERY TOP OF HIS CLASS IN ARCHITECTURE😢 EVEN ABOVE MURANO WHO IS CONSIDERED JAPAN'S TOP ARCHITECT BECAUSE MY GRANDFATHER DID NOT STAY THERE ACCORDING TO MURANO BUT CAME TO THE UNITED STATES TO WORK WITH FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT AND DID MANY OF THE JAPANESE STYLE BUILDINGS FOR WHICH HE NEVER GOT ANY CREDIT FOR HIS NAME WAS RICHARD WHY MINE YOU NEVER GOT CREDIT UNTIL THEY HAD YOU NEVER GOT CREDIT UNTIL THE MUSEUMS IN CHICAGO HELD AN EVENT CALLED THE MEN WHO SHAPED THE SKYLINE OF CHICAGO AND MY GRANDFATHER'S DRAWING FOR THE TRIBUNE BUILDING BECAME THE SYMBOL OF THE DISPLAY CALL THE MEN WHO SHAPED THE SKYLINE OF CHICAGO
DAVID ADAM GRENIS
2044 MAPLETON AVENUE BOULDER COLORADO
Why Frank Lloyd Was So Wright
FLW always a winner.
I was one of those who complained about a prior video being too far away from my own preconceived notions of what this channel was. I do not know if feedback of that type put this train back on these particular tracks, but I am very grateful it was. Thank you.
Great with Leaky Roofs.
To me Frank Lloyd Wright is a perfect embodiment of the American shift from good classical architecture (like Louis Sullivan) that was built to be beautiful and last as long as possible; which he did start with… but by the end he was just makin car-centric, cheap looking, low density sprawl structures that is all we seem capable of making anymore 😢
A nice, sensibly accurate vid.... where Wright's brilliant career stands as its own "testament". 👍
His pivotal theories surely opened-the-door for latter "experimentalists" like Frank Gehry, Robert Venturi, and Denise Scott Brown, et al....👌Many years ago I had the unforgettable opportunity of visiting Wright's stunning Fallingwater House in Pennsylvania = Sheer *_"poetry in motion"....._* even despite the purported, later structural issues. 🤩
Mom purchased him. ?