Frank Lloyd Wright

by Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer

Hardcover

Published January 1, 2008

Reviews

[Marc]

In the summer of 1984 I stayed with my cousins. My aunt took us on a road trip to Pennsylvania and somewhere along the way we ended up at Fallingwater (the renowned summer home---pictured on this book cover---Wright designed and built for the Kaufman family in Mill Run, PA). Ranging in ages from 8 to 10, my aunt decided we were too young to see the inside of the house. She took our older cousins on the tour while we three boys stayed in the parking lot for about an hour kicking gravel and throwing stones. My one cousin never forgave her. So for his 50th birthday last year, I bought two tickets for an extended tour and we went on a road trip of our own in August (2026) to right this historical injustice of our childhood.

It was magnificent. And while I had certainly heard of Wright, I don't believe I'd visited a single one of his buildings or homes in person. So it seemed like serendipity that after the trip, I should happen upon this book in my local library, especially given that the library maybe had 3 or 4 architecture books in total. After a few pages of introductory biographical text, this over-sized Taschen book is largely photographs highlighting some of Wright's best known works along with his preliminary sketches and perspective drawings for many of the designs. Each structure gets about a paragraph summary (with English, German, and French translations throughout). It provides a lovely gallery without quite as much context as Wright deserves.

But then there's no shortage of resources, books, websites, and videos about Wright. I just watched this highly informative and entertaining one today (How This Famous Architect Changed America | Architectural Digest): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pl-C5...