Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright Architect of Fallingwater

Frank Lloyd Wright is one of the most influential architects. Read a brief biography below, select from books for more in depth information on his greatest buildings. Also: Frank Lloyd Wright Interiors and Furniture

Frank Lloyd Wright
Wright was born in Wisconsin in 1867. His mother, even before his birth, was determined that he should be an architect. He pawned some of his father's books in 1887 and left for Chicago where he went to work for Joseph Lyman Silsbee as a tracer for eight dollars a week. A year later, he left Silsbee to work for Dankmar Adller and Louis Sullivan. He acknowledged Sullivan as his Lieber Meister (beloved master) and worked for him until 1893.

Wright built a home near Spring Green, Wisconsin in 1911. He called it Taliesin, Welsh for "shining brow." In many ways, Taliesin is the quintessential Prairie Style home, merging as it does with the landscape on which it is sited. Through personal tragedies, he rebuilt and continued to develop Taliesin throughout the remainder of his life. Here he formed a fellowship of apprentices who paid tuition and completed projects on the Taliesin buildings. He built Taliesin West in Arizona in 1938. His school wintered there.

Over the course of his career, Wright designed the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, the Johnson Wax Building, the Guggenheim Museum, and numerous houses, including Fallingwater near Bear Run, Pennsylvania. His contribution to affordable housing was the Usonian house; he believed that everyone should have a custom designed home. Wright often designed every detail of a house, including furniture, lighting, and window detail. Some of the most exquisite art glass is found in Prairie Style homes.

Wright died in 1959 before the Guggenheim was completed. He is buried at Taliesin.