The Journal Times Online - Racine, Wisconsin

Great pics! Thanks for sharing.

Flat roofs in snow bound Wisconsin and Minnesota. Brilliant!

Designs that made clients happy to pay far more than the proposed cost. Brilliant!

I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I think most everything attributed Frank loyd Wright, is over rated. I think because of SCJ, he is a some kind of god in Racine. Crap to me!

Edge - I don't think it has anything to do with SCJ other than it is thre reason so many Racinians are familiar with Wright's work, growing up with some of his best and most popular buildings in our backyard. An artist is going to be very well-known and popular anywhere there work is prevalent.

No art or design is for everybody, but Wright's designs speak very powerfully to many people. My family will soon be renting one of his homes for two nights, and we have rented another one twice. Living in the spaces he created, even for a small amount of time, has a significant emotional and even physical effect on me, and it certainly is not because of some devotion to a local business. Judging by the guestbook, almost everyone who has one of his buildings to themselves for a period of time has a similar experience.

I think you're right, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and I don't think anyone "should" like his work. But I don't know why those from Racine who do like it would like it for any reason other than why millions of people from around the world for over a century have.

..."their" work is prevalent. Sorry, doing too many things at once.

DA,
OK I'll take your word for it. I'm just not an artsy person. No offense intended. I've never lived in any of his buildings.

None taken, Edge. I wasn't being defensive or preachy, just explaining my thoughts on why many like his work.

Like I said, no art or design is for everybody. Even if you were an artsy person, you would like some stuff but not others. It wouldn't mean you didn't "get it," just that it didn't appeal to you. I for one do not care for most contemporary architecture, but Wright had an amazing ability to combine geometric and organic design that I have seen in very few contemporary homes.

As Winger points out, much of his work was impractical (but I will point out that he was not exactly the only person to use flat roofs. I believe there are only three Wright homes in Racine, but probably thousands of flat roofed houses), but much of it was also genius. His lillypad columns in the JWax Administration Building held several times what they were required to during a famous test when no one thought they would support anywhere near enough, and I believe he was the first person to come up with the concept of radiant floor heating not widely used for years if not decades after he put it in his homes.

Exterior features and landscaping was often used to help heat and cool the home, making them quite energy efficient for the day. Vines on a home would provide shade inside, as would large overhangs that blocked the sunlight from entering the windows in summer, yet allow it in to heat the room in winter. A lot of what he did was not only impressive visually, but also from a strictly engineering standpoint. Unfortunately, as with most pioneers in any field, a lot of his ideas did not work well at all. But I imagine even a few of Einstein's theories didn't pan out either.