Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright

A well known American architect who is considered to be one of the most innovative and influential figures in Modern Architecture. His career spanned over 70 years, allowing him to take adavantage of new developments in building materials and techniques that came about during the Machine Age. He is best known for his style of Organic Architecture. This is a style based on natural forms. The principals are: Simplicity - no unnecessary walls. Multiple style - houses should not nesecarily be built in a certain style, but should be built to meet the requirements of the individual. Sympathy (harmony) with the environment - the building should seem to grow from the environment, being made from local materials and matching the color of the environment. Buildings should bring people joy - this principal speaks for itself. His principals were most similar to those of the Arts and Crafts Movement, though not as conservative or traditionally rooted.

Born June 8, 1867 to William Carey Wright and Anna Lloyd Jones. He Lived in Wisconsin, where his mother taught him at a young age by using a system developed by a German educationalist, Friedrich Froebel. It consisted of games which involved putting together simple primary colored, geometric shapes to make imaginative constructions. This system would later become very popular and is called Kindergarten. Wright says in his autobiography that those "simple toys" were very influental to his architectural work. Wright never graduated from high school but went on to become an apprentice to a builder who was also the Dean on Engineering at the University of Wisconsin. There he was trained in draftsmanship.

Eventually Frank Lloyd Wright started his own architecture practice in Chicago. He flourished in what he termed "Organic Architecture". This was a building style based on natural forms. He was very successful throughout his long career and not only did he design and build houses, but he designed everything that went in them as well. From the windows, furniture, light fixtures and other accessories.

Wright's works can be broken up into four different periods:

• The Early Period - This includes the Queen Anne or Shingle styles as well as his freelance "bootleg houses".




• The Prarie Period - 1901-1910's this was a new house form characterised by strong horizontal and organic architecture. He used natural materials and harmony between the building and its site.




• The Textile Block Period - Decorative, Mayan-inspired, cast concrete houses.





• Usonian Period - 1935-55 lower cost than the Prarie houses, these could be built by the client and could also be prefabricated.

Frank Lloyd Wright designed over a thousand projects in his career. Some of the most famous ones include:

The Kaufmann House, also known as Fallingwater

The Guggenheim Museum in New York

The Imperial Hotel in Japan. It was constructed so well that it survived the great Kanto Earthquake in 1923 which leveled everything else around it.