Tommaso Gallo III A

My project
My fascination for Frank Lloyd Wright started when I saw a picture of one of his most beautiful

masterpieces in a book: the name of this house is Fallingwater.

I chose this subject because I would like to become an architect. I think architects can influence people’s

life-style and they can change and make the environment around us safer.

People need places to live in, work, play, shop and eat, and architects are responsible for designing these

places.

What interested me most about Wright was his creativity and how his production is still attractive,

functional and modern. His determination and self-confidence enable him to persevere and answer in

different and unconventional ways to many different challenges. This is the reason why many people

around the world still consider him America’s greatest architect.

WHO WAS FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT

“I believe in God, only I spell it Nature. I go to nature every day for

inspiration…”

Frank Lloyd Wright was born on June 8th, 1867, almost one hundred years ago, and died in 1959.

His family was of very modest means. They lived in a small two-bedroom home in Richland, Wisconsin, and

moved many times before he was eleven.

After a few years of high school, he wanted to learn how to design buildings and so he began to take classes

at the University of Wisconsin. At that time university didn’t offer classes in architecture but it only offered

classes in engineering and drafting. The drafting classes taught him how to draw buildings and floor plans.

The engineering classes taught him how to design buildings that wouldn’t collapse.

After only a few semesters at the University of Wisconsin Wrights became restless. He didn’t want to be an

engineer, or draw buildings another architect had designed. He wanted to design buildings himself and he

knew that the best way to learn would be to work for an architect.

At the age of twenty, Wright went to Chicago and very soon joined the Adler&Sullivan Architects Company,

where his career began.

No other modern architect had such a diversified building career—from skyscrapers to gas

stations, factories to flower stalls—Wright wanted to reinvent all aspects of life.

Designing 1,114 architectural works of all types—532 of which were realized—he created some of

the most monumental and most intimate spaces in the United States.
THE FUTURE AND THE ENVIRONMENT IN MIND.

WRIGHTS GOES GREEN.

As for the future—“Wright prophesied, “The work shall grow more truly simple; more expressive

with fewer lines, fewer forms; more articulate with less labor; more plastic; more fluent, although

more coherent; more organic.”

He created in fact what he termed ORGANIC 1 ARCHITECTURE.

Organic buildings were inspired by the natural materials on the site: the interior space and

furnishings and the exterior structure and surrounding environment were to look as if they were

joined, just as a part of human body or a tree’s limbs and trunk.

Wright also insisted on designing organic buildings with ENERGY CONSERVATION and nature in

mind similar to what we now call BUILDING GREEN.

Frank Lloyd Wright was not only proud of the exteriors of the buildings he designed. He also believed the

furniture and interior spaces he created would change architecture forever. And they did. He wanted to

demonstrate that the things we live with and the buildings we live in or near, don’t have to be unattractive.

They can be beautiful, inspiring, exciting and can even be designed respecting nature, energy conservation,

and the environment.

He considered himself a prophet and disdained 2 architects who lacked a vision for the future: “If he can’t

see at least ten years ahead, don’t call him an architect”

WRIGHT’S OAK PARK HOUSE AND STUDIO

At the age of twenty-one Wright met the girl who became his first wife, Catherine Tobin, named Kitty.
Over the next sixteen years the Wrights had six children.

Oak Park is one of the first masterpieces of Wrights. He kept expanding his house in order to provide the

different needs of all the family.

The exterior of the house was quite traditional and similar to many American houses in 1889. It had a large

triangular roof, called a gable, facing the street. The house was covered with cedar shingles 3. Cedar and

redwood shingles didn’t need to be painted, which would save money, and become even more beautiful

over time changing color as they were exposed to rain and snow.

The inside of the house was very different from the typical American house.

Wright designed his house with many large windows to make the rooms feel bright.

He made the ground floor one continuous space, without doors. Today “open plan” is common, but it was

unusual in 1889.

He designed the children’s playroom thinking about what kind of room a child might like to play in. He

installed a balcony reached by a hidden set of stairs so the children could perform using the balcony as a

stage.
He designed an octagonal studio for Oak Park that included an entrance hall, a library, a small office and a

two-story drafting room. The balcony was very impressive because it hung on chains and could support

several desks. Wright also built a private link to the studio so he could slip in and out his house from a

secret corridor connecting the house with the studio.

Nowadays you can visit WRIGHT’S OAK PARK HOUSE AND STUDIO. Have a look at the web site

www.franklloydwright.org

FALLINGWATER

The 1929 stock market crash and subsequently the Great Depression had a serious impact on construction,

putting a lot of architects out of work.

Mr. Edgar Sr. Kaufmann wanted Wright to design his weekend house. They went together to the

Kaufmann’s rugged plot of land at Mill Run.

 Fallingwater is located in southwest Pennsylvania's Laurel Highlands
about 90 minutes from downtown Pittsburgh

Most architects would have considered the Kaufmann’s land impossible to build on, because it was steep4

and rocky5, but Wright welcomed the challenge as the chance of a lifetime. He accepted the commission

immediately but didn’t resolve where to site the house.

Wright created one of the most captivating houses in the world, the pinnacle of organic architecture.

Wright designed Fallingwater to look as if it couldn’t exist without the waterfall and to enhance 6 rather

than disrupt7 its natural surroundings.

Instead of placing the house where the Kaufmanns would have the best view of the waterfall (as many

architects would have done), he positioned the building right on top of it.
Wright designed Fallingwater as a series of balconies hanging in the space over the waterfall. The balconies

are cantilevered8 and they step down mimicking 9 the levels of waterfalls: the steal beans holding up the

balconies are supported only at one end.

Wright said about Fallingwater: “The outside may come inside (through the windows, the boulder, and the

sound of the waterfall) and the inside may, and does, go outside (because each principal room is extended

out of doors and becomes a balcony that seems to float over the waterfall).

2 to disdain v. tr. sdegnare, disdegnare

3 cedar shingles n. scaglie di cedro, assicelle di copertura per uso edilizio in legno di cedro

7 to disrupt v.tr. disturbare, intralciare; interrompere

8 cantilever n trave a sbalzo, lunga trave in legno o metallo che sporge da una parete o muro; fine di un

ponte.