Frank Lloyd Wright (1867 – 1959)
Frank Lloyd Wright is America’s most famous architect. During his 70-year career, Frank Lloyd Wright designed 1,141 buildings, including homes, offices, churches, schools, libraries, bridges, and museums. Five hundred and thirty-two of these designs were completed, and 409 still stand.
Frank Lloyd Wright never attended architecture school. As a child, he worked on his uncle’s farm in Wisconsin, and he later described himself as an American primitive – an innocent but clever country boy whose education on the farm made him more perceptive and more down-to-earth.
Frank Lloyd Wright pioneered a long, low style known as the Prairie house. He experimented with obtuse angles and circles, creating unusually shaped structures such as the spiral Guggenheim Museum (1943-49). He developed a series of low-cost homes that he called Usonian. And most importantly, Frank Lloyd Wright changed the way we think of interior space.
Frank Lloyd Wright was married three times and had seven children. His work was controversial and his private life was often the subject of gossip. Although his work was praised in Europe as early as 1910, it was not until 1949 that he received an award from American Institute of Architects.
Prominent Work in Los Angeles:
Hollyhock House (1921) – 4808 Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles
The House is part of a complex of residences, theatres, shops and artist apartments designed for heiress Aline Barnsdall. While the entire complex was never realized, the house, two guest residences and a spring house were built. Wright described the architecture of Hollyhock House as “California Romantic”, a cross between Prairie style and his later textile block designs. The interiors include a reproduction of Wright’s original living room furniture. Hollyhock House is recognized by the American Institute of Architects as one of the seventeen Wright buildings that are representative of his contribution to American culture.
Ennis House (1924) – 2655 Glendower Avenue, Los Angeles
Built for Mabel and Charles Ennis and for a time called the Ennis-Brown House to honor its seventh owner, Augustus Oliver Brown, who donated it for public use, Ennis House is on the National Register of Historic Places, a Los Angeles Cultural Heritage Monument, and a California State Landmark. Sited on a hillside overlooking the city of Los Angeles, Wright’s last and largest concrete block house commands attention even from the street below it. Its commanding presence has not been lost on the Hollywood film industry and it has starred in many films, including Blade Runner, Black Rain and The House on Haunted Hill.
Freeman House (1924) – 1962 Glencoe Way, Hollywood
The Samuel Freeman House, one of three textile block houses built in the Hollywood Hills in the 1920s, was built for two members of the Los Angeles avant-garde who met Wright at Aline Barnsdall’s. They asked Wright to design a home for them with a budget of $10,000. Harriet Freeman lived in the house until 1986, when she donated it to the University of Southern California.
Anderton Court Shops (1952) – 333 N. Rodeo Drive, Beverly Hills
These shops are a little-known Wright design that is not generally recognized as one of his better works. The design is a series of small boutiques around a central light well, connected by an angular ramp. The tower is similar to the one at the Marin Civic Center. Today’s canopy and signage are later additions, not consistent with Wright’s original design. There are no organized tours, but the shops are easily accessible.
