"Wright's greatest contribution to architecture, I think, is his unit system of design. All his plans consist of units grouped in a symmetrical and consistent way. ... Most men outline the strictly utilitarian requirements, choose their style, and then mould the design along those lines, whereas Wright develops his unit first, then fits his design to the requirements as much as possible, or rather, fits the requirements to the design. I do not mean by this that he ignores the requirements, but rather that he approaches his work in a broad minded architectural way, and never allows any of the petty wants of his client to interfere with the architectural expression of his design."-- Charles E. White, draftsman for Wright, in a letter of 1904.

This Week:

There is a great temptation to believe that Chicago always mistook quantity for quality in cultural enterprises, but in at least one area -- architecture -- the city is widely seen (just as thoughtlessly) as the site of the most brilliant design of the modern epoch. Among Chicago's leading architects-- including Louis Sullivan, Daniel Burnham, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe -- Frank Lloyd Wright has been singled out as the greatest architectural artist of our century. But what is the art of architecture? And why might Frank Lloyd Wright's work be considered so extraordinary?

Readings:

• Vincent Scully, Frank Lloyd Wright, (New York: Braziller, 1960)
• In course packet:
  Richard MacCormac, "The Anatomy of Wright's Aesthetic" in H. Allen Brooks ed., Writings on Wright (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1981), pp. 163-174
  Grant Hildebrand, The Wright Space (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1981), pp. 18-72, 106-115
  Neil Levine, "Wright's Own Houses", in Robert Nelson et al., eds., The Nature of Frank Lloyd Wright (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), pp.20-69.
  
  All four authors try to explain how one should analyze and experience Wright's work. Scully is an art historian, but he is also someone who knew Wright personally and who has had tremendous influence on contemporary American architecture with his evocative analyses -- especially on Louis I. Kahn and Robert Venturi. MacCormac and Hildebrand present simple but very clear ways of talking about Wright's early buildings, MacCormac by focusing on their plans, Hildebrand by walking us through the buildings to explain the experience of them. Levine tries to understand what the houses Wright built for himself meant to him, especially in terms of their method of construction and relation to the environment.

Electronic Resources: Week 7 Notebook

Questions to consider:

• Try to think through several Wright designs, from function and site, through the lay-out of space, to the final result. Walk through them in your mind.What do you see? How do they feel?
• Go and see a Wright building, for example, the Brown house on the south side of Harrison Street two houses east of the corner with MacDaniel Avenue in Northwest Evanston. What is your assessment of it? How does it compare to the houses around it?
• Try to figure out for yourself what makes for quality in architecture. Wright was largely a house architect -- think about your own "dream home", how you would ideally like it to be, and how a Wright house would measure up on that standard.

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Last Updated: 02/04/99