Wright On - Loving Frank!

We have a Highlight Tour in the afternoon of the Frank Lloyd Wright home, Taliesin (Welsh for "shiny brow" because the house sits on the brow of a mountain top with the sun shining on it). This is a whirlwind tour first of the Hillside Studio house where the school of architecture trains students still today. We find out that Frank's architectural trademarks include "organic architecture" using natural elements to the area of a building, so there is lots of stone, wood and trees used in his buildings. Also Wright loved music and the beams on the ceiling often resemble piano keys and he has several grand pianos in his Taliesin home. He also incorporates low ceilings, thus manipulating the guests toward the higher ceilings away from doorways. Rip was not the only one who had to duck many times on the tour to clear the ceiling height. His front doors are often hidden from view, forcing his guests to see the entire outside of the house in order to find the way in! Also Wright was the innovator of large, tall windows - and in this case the views of the valley and Wisconsin River are amazing so the windows join the building to nature. Wright also loves the Japanese influence. He spent several years in Japan designing the Imperial Hotel, and he uses Asian artifacts and rooflines and Japanese screens in his design. He loves asymmetry so often offsets fireplaces and builds unexpected angles and arches. Wright was a Unitarian and thus viewed nature as sacred so his buildings look like they are part of the natural landscape - he even had a huge farm and only bought cows that were brown to fit in with the earth!! Those who have read "Loving Frank" would have loved this tour where his journey is brought to life. Wright on! Our tour guide mentioned several times that no one loved Frank more than Frank! Wright's work over 7 decades can been seen throughout Spring Green where his grandmother had a farm and wanted him to take over farming, but in Wright's words farming was "too tired, too tired". Now we had better get on our Western tour even thought we are "too tired" or we will never get there!