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• 1 2015-09-30T00:38:51-07:00 Biographical Information and Famous Commissions 28 image_header 2015-12-12T21:37:59-08:00

  
  From the very beginning, Frank Lloyd Wright was destined for greatness. Wright was the eldest son to his parents, Anna Lloyd Jones and William Carey Wright, born in Richland Center, Wisconsin in 1867. Mrs. Wright knew before his birth that he was going to be a great architect. She hung pictures of buildings in his room and gave him Froebel gifts for creative learning at age 9. Wright grew up constantly moving because his father was never satisfied in his career and wanted a change in scenery. Wright developed a profound love and appreciation of nature from spending many summers on his uncle’s farm in Spring Green. At a young age, Wright's parents split up and he never saw his father after that. This left Mrs. Wright the sole responsibility of raising him. Having a single parent household took a toll on the family and often left Wright with the responsibility of bringing home income. This did not allow him to fully concentrate on his education. Wright attended Madison High School, but did not graduate and started working for engineering professor, Allan D. Conover. In 1886, Wright was hired for construction under Joseph Lyman Silsbee and was accepted into the University of Wisconsin. At first Wright was taking engineering classes, but soon switched to architecture.
  
  College did not last long, and at age 20, he left to work in Chicago. Wright continued working with Silsbee and then was hired as Chief of Design by Louis Sullivan. This partnership grew quickly and led to Wright signing a five year contract with Sullivan. Sullivan also loaned Wright $5,000 to build a home in Oak Park, Illinois. Within the next couple of years, Wright married Catherine Lee “Kitty” Tobin, was promoted to head draftsman at Adler & Sullivan, and became a father. His son, Frank Lloyd Jr. (Lloyd), was born in 1890. His son John was born two years later, followed by Catherine, David, Frances, and Robert. While still contracted with Sullivan, Wright was taking private home commissions on the side. When Sullivan found out, Wright was fired. In 1893, Wright built his first home as an independent architect, the William H. Winslow House in River Forest, IL. Six years later, Wright’s first “prairie style” home, the Joseph Husser House, was erected in Chicago, IL.
  
  At the turn of the century, Wright was busy commissioning many of his “prairie style” homes across the midwest. In the midst of Wright’s rising fame, he began a romantic affair with Mamah Borthwick Cheney, wife of client Edwin Cheney. Wright continued staying busy by traveling to Japan and designing the Unity Temple​ in Oak Park, IL. The Unity Temple is known to be Wright’s first modern commission. After being in a relationship with Mamah for six years, they both left their families and moved to Europe. This stunt and denial of the affair drastically hurt his career and reputation, making him come back to the United States the next year. Wright convinced his mother to purchase adjacent land in Spring Green for him to build Taliesin. A year later, Mamah came to Spring Green to join Wright at Taliesin. Seven people, including Mamah and her two children, were murdered and Taliesin was destroyed three years later by Taliesin cook Julian Carlton. Taliesin was then rebuilt from the fire in their memory. Wright’s job offers were slow and scarce the next decade. Kitty finally granted Wright a divorce in 1922, which allowed Wright to remarry to Miriam Noel the next year, following a ten year relationship.
  
  Less than a year after getting married, Wright met Olgivanna Lazovich Hinzenberg and fell in love at first sight. Not long after, Olgivanna left her husband and moved into Taleisin. To keep money coming into the household, Wright turned to writing and lecturing due to very few homes being built. In 1932, Wright created the Taliesin Fellowship. This was an apprenticeship program for emerging architects. The students paid to live and work with Wright at the cost of $600 a year. Three years later the Fallingwater summer home was in the works, arguably Wright’s most famous design. This project led to an increase in commissions, including corporate buildings. Wright purchased 800 acres outside of Scottsdale, Arizona for his winter home, Taliesin West. World War II brought Wright’s career to a halt and quickly picked up once the war was over with an increase in students at Taliesin and an increase in commissions. The next 14 years were filled with a variety of work all the way up until his death in 1959 at age 91.

  
  Famous Commissions:

  • 1893- William H. Winslow House, River Forest, IL

  • 1895- Prairie School, Spring Green, WI

  • 1899- Joseph Husser House, Chicago, IL

  • 1902- Larkin Administration Building, Buffalo, NY

  • 1903- Edwin H. Cheney House, Oak Park, IL

  • 1905- Unity Temple, Oak Park, IL

  • 1908- Frederick C. Robie House, Chicago, IL

  • 1913- Midway Gardens, Chicago, IL

  • 1916- Commissioned to build Tokyo’s Imperial Hotel

  • 1917- Hollyhock House, Aline Barnsdall House, Los Angeles, CA

  • 1935- Fallingwater, a summer home in Bear Run, PA and Wright’s model of Broadacre City is displayed at the Industrial Arts Exposition at Rockefeller Center in New York

  • 1937- Herbert Jacobs House I,  Madison, WI

  • 1938- Designs master plan for Florida Southern College

  • 1939- Johnson Wax Headquarters, Racine, WI

  • 1946- First Unitarian Society Meeting House, Shorewood Hills, WI

  • 1948- V. C. Morris Gift Shop, San Francisco, CA

  • 1953- Beth Sholom Synagogue, Elkins Park, PA

  • 1955- Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church, Wauwatosa, WI

  • 1956- Marin County Civic Center, San Rafael, CA

  • 1959- The Guggenheim, New York, unveiled six months after Wright’s death
  
  Works Cited

  “Frank Lloyd Wright Biography.” Biography. A&E Television Networks, 2015. Web. 5 Nov. 2015. <http://www.biography.com/people/frank-lloyd-wright-9537511>.

  Twombly, Robert C. Frank Lloyd Wright His Life and His Architecture. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1979. Print.  

  “Visual Timeline.” Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation. Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, n.d. Web. 5 Nov. 2015. <http://www.franklloydwright.org/frank-lloyd-wright/visual-timeline.html>.