Issue Jul 24th 2024 July 24th 2024

The Headlines

Frank Lloyd Wright Trust Celebrates 50 Years of Community

Fifty years ago this week, on July 17, 1974, the Frank Lloyd Wright Trust opened the doors of Wright’s Home and Studio in Oak Park, Illinois to the public for tours for the first time. The nonprofit was founded as the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio Foundation in June of 1974 when a group of determined preservationists planted the seeds for what is today a model of historic preservation, education and tourism.

Not all of the original founders are still around, but a fair number of them were in Oak Park on the second weekend in July to celebrate the institution now known as the Frank Lloyd Wright Trust. “The 50th anniversary dinner brought together past directors, presidents, founding members and current volunteers,” said Celeste Adams, president and CEO of the trust. “Everyone shares in the achievement.” Follow the link to read more.

Wright In Kankakee Hosting "Taliesin Tragedy"

Katelyn Walker will give a 1920s-themed lecture on Aug. 5 at 5pm covering the history of Frank Lloyd Wright, his Taliesin scandal, and his career directly after the murders at the Taliesin. Come in 1920-era dress and take advantage of the photo booth.

The lecture will take place in the living room of the historic B. Harley Bradley House, 701 S. Harrison Ave., Kankakee, Illinois. Tickets cost $15, and snacks and drinks are included. Guests must be 18 years or older to attend. To purchase tickets, go to wright1900.org/events.

For more information, call the Bradley House office at 815-936-9630.

Inside The Texas "Sand Dollar House"

Have you ever considered living in a rounded and biomorphic? You’re in luck! This curvaceous abode in Texas, dubbed "The Sand Dollar House," could make that dream a reality. Built in 1979 by John Covert Watson, an architect who studied under Frank Lloyd Wright while he was building NYC’s Guggenheim Museum in the 1950s. Today, those Guggenheim influences are evident throughout the home’s organic design, with its curved interior walls and circular roofline. The one-of-a-kind biomorphic structure was designed as a second residence for artist Eugenia Hunt and is capped by a circular roof that, from the air, looks almost exactly like a sand dollar.

Karena Dawn and Bobby Goldstein, a married couple who co-founded the fitness company Tone It Up, most recently acquired the unconventional residence for an undisclosed price in 2021, according to The Wall Street Journal. They updated the deck but reportedly didn’t make any changes to the interior. Now ready to move on, the couple has hoisted the fungus-like cultural landmark back on the market for $1.99 million. Michelle Jones and Todd Grossman of Compass hold the listing.

The extraordinary residence is set back from a main road and perched on a vegetated bluff in Lakeway, a city just outside of Austin that is known for its golf courses and marinas. Its modern design is composed of steel and gunite—the same material used to build swimming pools—which shape its curvy façade and even curvier interiors. Three bedrooms and two bathrooms, plus a powder room, span the pad’s 2,240 square feet. Petal-shaped skylights and round windows are among its organic charms, but the home’s porches and decks add to the appeal.

Beyond the entrance, the living room offers panoramic vistas of the lake, thanks to a bank of floor-to-ceiling glass; skylights shower the space with natural light. Other sinuous features that come into focus as you move through the home are an arched, kiva-style fireplace that anchors the great room and a swooping built-in banquette in the dining area. A wet bar, a U-shaped kitchen with 180-degree views, and a spiral staircase further accent the home’s whimsical nature.

Inside the primary bedroom, details like an arched fireplace and curved ceiling stand out among wooden doors, and its en-suite bath channels the work of Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí, featuring a curved dual sink and soaking tub embellished with jewel-like emerald green tiles. A huge circular window in the open shower space slides open for fresh air.

Watson designed the home for entertaining, according to the listing, and, with a variety of outside spaces for alfresco leisure, it’s not hard to see why. A covered terrace off the living room overlooks the lower-level outdoor patio. A grassy patch affords residents and guests an ideal spot for private sunbathing, and lush foliage ensures total privacy from neighboring homes.

Wright and Like 2024:: Racine & Vacinity

Over a 30-year timespan, Wright in Wisconsin, Inc., and predecessor organizations, have facilitated awareness of the architecture, vision, legacy and genius of Frank Lloyd Wright, his apprentices, and fellow architects through their Wright and Like home tours across Wisconsin. This year their 2024 Wright and Like: Racine tour is scheduled for Saturday, September 7th, the weekend following Labor Day.

For 2024, Wright in Wisconsin is pleased to be back in Racine, a city where just the right economic circumstances allowed Frank Lloyd Wright and allied architects to thrive and produce world-famous buildings that we very much appreciate today. Follow the link to see the buildings you'll enjoy seeing on the tour and make sure to get your tickets!

Working With Frank Lloyd Wright: The Architect’s Last Living Client Shares His Experience With The Visionary

There’s no shortage of words that have been used over the years to describe Frank Lloyd Wright: brilliant, arrogant, unrivaled, cranky, inspiring, scandalous, or legendary, just to name some. But few can depict him like Roland Reisley. “He became a mentor and a friend,” the retired physicist who later worked in the electronic instrument business, tells Architectural Digest.

When Reisley was just 26 years old, Frank Lloyd Wright agreed to design a home for him and his wife, Ronny, who passed away a few years back. A little under 75 years later (he just celebrated his 100th birthday), he is Wright’s last living client. “The house has been wonderful, and my life here has been good,” he says. “I think the house has contributed to my health and longevity.”

In the early 1950s, Wright was highly revered as one of, if not the best, modern American architect. By this point, he’d already designed some of his most influential works—the Guggenheim Museum, Fallingwater, and the Imperial Hotel, for example—and despite family scandals, personal tragedies, and the fact that at 80-something years old he was well into his golden years, the architect was at the top of his game. The Reisleys, newlyweds at the time, never dreamed of asking him to design their home, but it just so happened that luck was on their side.

In 1950, the couple joined Usonia Homes, a cooperative community supervised by Frank Lloyd Wright, and chose a building site. One thing led to another, and Wright ultimately expressed interest in designing their home. “It was a remarkably good experience,” Reisley remembers. “I had a very good relationship with Frank Lloyd Wright.”

Wright’s original vision centered on a 1,800-square foot, low-slung house embedded into a small hill on the couple’s land. One of his Usonian creations, which were intended to be affordable and intertwined with the natural landscape, the residence was to be defined by a cantilevered carport and two stone masonry pillars. However, once the architect handed over the blueprints, Ronny noticed a problem. “She said there was no broom closet,” Reisley remembers. Further, there wasn’t space for the couple’s many books.

So Reisley made a decision. He would go talk to Wright at the Plaza Hotel, where the designer had an apartment, and ask for an adjustment. “It was not easy,” he says. “It was like talking to God.” As he voiced his concerns, he recalls Wright being incredibly—perhaps surprisingly—understanding. “Come on Roland, you’re my client and I’m your architect,” Reisley remembers Wright saying. “I’ll redesign your house as many times as I have to until it satisfies all of your needs. But you have to speak up.” A few decades later, Wright biographer Brendan Gill wrote of the encounter saying that if the physicist had been “ten years older and twice as self-confident, no doubt he would have elicited a very different response.”

Today, Reisley concedes that this assessment might be true, but, nonetheless, the conversation solidified their working relationship. “I knew to talk about needs and not stylistic preferences,” Reisley adds. “But from then on, everything went very well.” Wright even designed the couple an addition in 1956 to create more room for their growing family.

Though much of the architect’s work is documented in archival records, clients’ memories offer vital context that cannot be understood from sketches alone. Take the outdoor seating area, under which a large triangular part of the roof hangs. “I realized when we were building that it would be an ideal place for an acoustically significant loudspeaker,” Reisley says. Wright liked the idea, and recommended his client speak with a sound engineer to design the system. At the end of the 14-foot overhang are two 15-inch woofer loudspeakers, but a parallel wall had to be slightly readjusted to avoid creating standing waves, which would interfere with the sound. “So there is a slight change to the angle [Wright originally designed], and he was happy with that,” Reisley remembers.

This is just one of many stories he could tell about the months during which the residence was under construction. Perhaps most memorable, he recalls how expensive it was. “I always complained about that,” Reisley says. “I complained about the cost of things.” It wasn’t unusual for Wright’s projects to go over budget, and this home was no exception. But even when things were tight, Wright encouraged the couple to finish the home. “Building this house is one of the best things you can do. Stop if you must, and then continue when you can,” Wright told him. “I promise you’ll thank me.” Unsurprisingly, this turned out to be true. The architect even let the Reisleys defer payment when necessary. “He’d say, ‘Finish the house, pay me when you can,’” Reisley recalls.

Over seven decades later, Reisley has had to make very few changes. “It has functioned for newlyweds, infants, toddlers, teenagers, and an empty-nest period,” he says. “I was a widower for a few years and have a new partner now. It worked very well for all of those stages.” Never once has he had a desire to switch things up. “That wasn’t necessary here, the house was just right.”

A few years ago, Reisley was reflecting on his home when he had an epiphany: Not a single day has gone by that he hasn’t seen something beautiful. “The light on the stone, the grain of the wood, or something,” he says. In fact, new research has shown that observing aesthetically pleasing things can indirectly promote health and well-being by lowering stress and improving memory. “I used to joke about that as a nice speculation, but evidence is proving that it could also be true,” he says.

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