Happy Birthday, Roland! (And more Wright news)

Posted on May 20, 2025 by Mark Hertzberg

Today’s joy in the World of Wright is to wish Roland Reisley a happy 101st birthday! He and I were walking into Monona Terrace during the 2018 Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy conference in Madison when we passed this photograph and he exclaimed, “This is a photo of me working with Mr. Wright (and with David Henken, as Usonia was taking shape)!” He let me photograph him with the Pedro Guerrero photo:

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This is a link to the tribute I posted a year ago to mark his 100th birthday:

https://wrightinracine.net/2024/05/19/happy-100th-roland-reisley-day/

Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church:

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Work continues at the church in Wauwatosa, outside Milwaukee. Last fall I posted photos of the work on the roof:

https://wrightinracine.net/tag/annunciation-greek-orthodox-church/

When I visited last week, leading a Road Scholar tour, work had just finished pouring new concrete for the front steps. When outside work is finished, attention will shift inside, under the dome, as the carpet and pew cushions are replaced, and the pews are refinished.

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Taliesin News:

Taliesin Preservation (TPI) is advertising that they are hiring seasonal workers, with signs below Riverview Terrace, the Frank Lloyd Wright Visitors Center:

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This is the link to follow if you are interested:

https://www.taliesinpreservation.org/careers/

The most dramatic work on campus is evidenced by the scaffolding and plastic covering at the Assembly Hall at Hillside Home School because of water incursion. Repairs will be ongoing.

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TPI has launched a new “Frank Lloyd Wright in Madison” experience in partnership with Destination Madison and the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation. Details are at:

https://www.visitmadison.com/wright-in-madison/

My wife and I will be traveling to Banff National Park in Alberta later this spring. Wright’s 1911 Banff National Park Pavilion was demolished ca. 1938, but we have connected with someone who will show us where it stood. I will post after our trip. Here are two links for more information about the ill-fated Pavilion:

https://www.banff.ca/487/Frank-Lloyd-Wright-Pavilion

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banff_National_Park_Pavilion

Please scroll down for earlier articles on this website.

Spring 2025 Update from World of Wright

Posted on May 3, 2025 by Mark Hertzberg

There is good news on several fronts in the World of Wright.

Tower Tumult:

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In August I posted a piece about the Frank Lloyd Wright’s endangered Price Tower in Bartlesville, Oklahoma. The post includes a variety of interior photos of the structure, then having been repurposed as a boutique hotel:

https://wrightinracine.net/2024/08/14/tower-tumult-in-bartlesville/

I updated the story in February:

https://wrightinracine.net/2025/02/02/updates-tower-tumult-ann-macgregor/

The final chapter in the saga is expected Tuesday May 6 when McFarlin Building LLC will buy the building for $1.4 million. The Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy, which has been active in the effort to save the Tower, has posted a link to a story in the Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise:

https://www.examiner-enterprise.com/story/news/2025/04/30/price-tower-sale-mcfarlin-bankruptcy-court-bartlesville-oklahoma-frank-lloyd-wright/83355374007/?fbclid=IwY2xjawKDYctleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETF5SXYxQTJUbUs2bXVPTUJ0AR6GiTbGbWZPvmyxahd3gS6kwMvkk3-bzbe3aYil2SBtBy6SeA6j9Va5_9YvIg_aem_JbuMevvBarWSblZ-bdSs8Q

LR Price Tower a Sunrise 001.jpg The sun rises behind Price Tower at 5:42 a.m., April 30, 2011.

Wright in Wisconsin

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Wright in Wisconsin is the nation’s only statewide organization devoted to Wright’s architecture. It was founded in the 1990s in concert with the Wisconsin Department of Tourism. The annual “Wright and Like” tour encompasses the work of organic architects, in addition to Wright’s work.

I was proud to serve on the board from 2004 until 2020, including eight years as newsletter editor. The board’s accomplishments in those years included purchasing some of the American System-Built properties in Frank Lloyd Wright’s Burnham Block in Milwaukee, beginning in 2004, and working with the Department of Tourism and state highway department to establish the Frank Lloyd Wright Trail of public Wright sites in 2017.

LR FLW Trail Dedication 031.jpg H. Fisk Johnson, Chairman and CEO of SC Johnson, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, and Stephanie Klett, Secretary of the Wisconsin Department of Transportation formally dedicate the state’s Frank Lloyd Wright Trail in a ceremony in the Great Workroom of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed SC Johnson Administration Building in Racine, Wisconsin, Wednesday May 10, 2017. / Mark Hertzberg for SC Johnson

I resigned from the board and as newsletter editor when negative board dynamics made it impossible for me to continue in either role. I am pleased that there is an energetic new board in place, and I have happily rejoined the revitalized group as a member.

Much credit goes to George Hall who did yeoman’s service navigating the board problems as President, Past President, and Interim President. The organization would have been relegated to the dust heap if not for his work.

John Macy is the new board president. Other members are organic architect Ken Dahlin (Genesis Architects), Henry St Maurice (steward of Wright’s E. Clarke and Julie Arnold House with his wife, Mary Arnold, daughter of Wright’s clients), Trish Dulka, and Anne Hasse. Bill Swan continues as office manager and Jill Hartmann is the accountant. Dulka and Hasse are the newest board members. Dulka will be producing the newsletter, a member benefit that has been absent for several years.

I am particularly pleased that Hasse has joined the board. She is an educator at Wakanda Elementary School in Menominee, Wisconsin, in the far western part of the state. That breaks up the usual geographical cast of characters all from southeastern Wisconsin. I met her many years ago during my daily bicycle ride in Racine, a ride which takes me past Wright’s Thomas P. Hardy House. I wondered why there was a tour bus in front of the house. LR Wakanda 2017 015.jpg

Hasse began her teaching career in Racine. Hasse and Sally Johnson teach a unit to their fifth graders about “Breaking the Box” and pre-pandemic did a two-day road trip with their students to Wright commissions in Madison and Racine. We became friends. I introduced her to the late Gene Szymczak, who became steward of the Hardy House in 2012 and rehabilitated it, and he invited the students to tour the inside of his home:

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Hasse and Johnson were honored with a prestigious Wright Spirit Award from the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy at the annual conference in 2014, held at the Biltmore Hotel in Phoenix:

Wakanda WSA 002.jpg Hasse, center, and Johnson accept the award from Scott Perkins

Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church

In December I posted photographs of the work being done at Wright’s Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church in Wauwatosa, outside Milwaukee:

https://wrightinracine.net/2024/12/10/greek-church-roof-resplendent-again/

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Maria Pandazi has sent me an update about their work: “About $2.3 Million in projects – and more to come. We were awarded a Save America’s Treasures grant last year and will soon begin another phase of restoration. My friend Norm and I did a little presentation about the projects online for the Building Conservancy”

https://savewright.org/event/preservation-talk-annunciation-greek-orthodox-church/

Pandazi has the closest ties possible to the church: her uncle, the late Christ Seraphim, a Milwaukee County judge, was instrumental in securing the design commission for Wright. I worked with her on the board of Wright in Wisconsin when she served as president. I look forward to seeing the latest restoration work when I have the first of four visits there in two weeks, when I help lead the first of four week-long Wright tours for Road Scholar for 2025.

Roland Reisley Grant Program

Roland Reisley 2017 017.jpg Roland Reisley with a picture of he and his late wire, Ronnie, working with Wright on the design of their home in Usonia, Pleasantville, New York, in 2017.

Roland Reisley, the last living Wright client, has endowed a grant program with the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy. “Calling educators, artists, researchers, and all people with creative ideas: you have just 15 more days to apply for our inaugural Roland Reisley Grant! This award supports efforts to examine the intangible power of Wright’s architecture on mood, feelings and inspiration. Successful applicants will produce work or research examining or interpreting what it means to have a deeply personal experience in Wright-designed spaces. The deadline to apply is May 15:

https://savewright.org/roland-reisley-grant-pilot-program/?fbclid=IwY2xjawKDcXtleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETF5SXYxQTJUbUs2bXVPTUJ0AR690kSDdX_2rf9xu4LOacNus2SeS0iTfhjYdVchZkYX-ZANqG0cWOednz-z0g_aem_AOYOB-Yf_t-S-jYSMJBXNg

Minerva Montooth:

I had the pleasure of lunch with Minerva in April:

The other luncheon guests were Kathy Virnig and her friend Stephen Gochenaur, a docent at Taliesin.

Hardy House Views: 1904 – 2025

Posted on February 9, 2025 by Mark Hertzberg

Today I had the rare (and arguably unfortunate) opportunity to photograph Frank Lloyd Wright’s Thomas P. Hardy House in Racine, Wisconsin from the lake, without getting wet. Climate change is playing havoc with Lake Michigan (as it is with the world). In 2020, the water level was so high that the stewards of the house, and neighbors, had massive hunks of stone brought in to protect their property:

Today, well, I was able to walk out onto what had been part of the lake:

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The photograph below, taken through the two story living room windows, shows how much the water has receded:

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Taking my photographs today gave me the idea to show this view of the house through the years, in historic drawings and photos. First, we have Marion Mahony’s drawing, reproduced in House Beautiful magazine’s 1906 story about the house:

Then we have the earliest known photograph of the house, taken in 1906, as it neared completion:

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A 1908 photograph from the OA + D archives, shows significant growth of trees on the hill:

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The dining room terrace, which ended in a stucco wall, was demolished after World War II at the behest of the Sporers, second stewards of the house. There was a public beach, the 14th Street Beach, just south of the house (to the left of it in these drawings and photographs, until the 1970s. The Sporers asked Wright to give them a recreation room under the dining room terrace. Edgar Tafel sketched plans on Mahony’s drawing before leaving the Taliesin Fellowship in 1941. The work was not done until after the war. Full-length windows, including a door, opened to the outside:

Terrace sketch PPT.jpg © 2025 Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, AZ. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation Archives (The Museum of Modern Art | Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, Columbia University, New York), from Jim and Margaret Yoghourtjian’s collection

Next, is from David Archer’s collection. He grew up in the house between 1947 – 1957:

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Schuyler and Peterkin Seward were stewards of the house from 1957 – 1963:

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Jim and Margaret Yoghourtjian were the final stewards (1968 – 2012) before the late Gene Szymczak who bought, and rehabilitated the house in 2012. Margaret took these photos:

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The beach was lost in the 1970s when the City of Racine closed off a breakwater across from the house. Jim Yoghourtjian told me that they lost about 125 feet of property when the lake filled in below the house. While the Yoghourtjians used to share the house with interested parties, as they sensed people were taking them for granted and not respecting that they lived in a private home, rather than a public site, they let the landscape grow wild, to shield them from boaters on the lake and people walking the lakeshore:

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A week after buying the house, Szymczak had the hill cleared:

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And that, brings us to today:

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There is no telling what the lake will do next.

Updates: Tower Tumult; Ann MacGregor

Posted on February 2, 2025 by Mark Hertzberg

Tower Tumult: On August 14 I posted about the critical situation facing Frank Lloyd Wright’s Price Tower in Bartlesville, Oklahoma (I do not know why the URL mentions the unrelated SC Johnson Research Tower). The post includes a variety of photos of Price Tower:

https://wrightinracine.net/tag/sc-johnson-research-tower/

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On January 16 a judge ordered that utilities (heat) be restored to the building. On January 21 he ordered the sale to a responsible party from Tulsa that is known for their restoration of an historic hotel there. On January 22 the current owners filed for bankruptcy. They have still not turned the utilities back on, and so this saga drags on. The question of Wright artifacts from the building that were given to an auction house in Dallas, in spite of an easement prohibiting that has not been resolved, either. Among the heroes in this story are the staff and legal counsel of the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy. Their continuing updates on the story are at:

https://savewright.org/endangered-price-tower-in-bartlesville-oklahoma/

The Building Conservancy is going deep, deep into their funds set aside for legal work as the battle to save the building drags on. Please don’t let the sunset on the building, as I literally did when I took this photograph in 2014. Hint: they would welcome your financial support at:

https://savewright.org/give/

Remembering Ann MacGregor: On November 23 I posted a tribute to the late Ann MacGregor, one of the heroes in Mason City, Iowa’s successful quest to save Wright’s only extant hotel commission, the then-dilapidated Park Inn Hotel and adjoining City National Bank building. The hotel is now a successful boutique hotel:

https://wrightinracine.net/2024/11/23/remembering-ann-macgregor/

LR Pre-dinner 012.jpg Ann MacGregor with Scott Perkins of the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy, 2012

My tribute to Ann mentioned her long-term correspondence with Marshall Jones, a friend of mine, who is serving two consecutive life terms for homicide in Wisconsin. He became interested in Wright after I interviewed him for a project about the criminal justice system.

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I wrote Marshall to tell him about Ann’s passing, and sent him a copy of my story. He wrote me back last week (mail to the prison system faces interminable delays while it is sent to a place in Maryland that copies incoming letters and then sends the copies to inmates) with his own tribute to Ann:

“I appreciate you for sending me the news of Ann’s passing. A part of me was deeply saddened, but another part of me was greatly appreciative that I had the privilege of being considered her friend, She was so much more than someone that I corresponded with. She was someone who brought unconditional love, unconditional positive regard, she allowed me to peer into her beautiful family, and she gave me priceless guidance. She didn’t see me by my conviction, nor did she allow me to accept my worst decision as the resounding theme for my life. She was ruthless when it came to goals, and when you said that you wanted to accomplish something, she pressed you until it was done. She was amazingly supportive and she encouraged me with gentleness and love. You knew that Ann had your back. We talked about Mr. Wright, religion (we were both Christians), politics, family, and life. Her disposition increased in positivism even in the face of diminishing health. So, I am grateful for her life, and for her presence in my life. I was so blessed by her, and I am better because of her friendship. It was much deeper than correspondence. With Ann and Bruce (Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer also corresponded with Marshall), I was family. I now carry her with me everywhere I go.”

Well, Marshall, my story was more of the nuts and bolts of her life, as we used to say in the newsroom. You captured her essence. Thank you.

Greek Church Roof Resplendent Again

Posted on December 10, 2024 by Mark Hertzberg

The brilliant blue dome roof of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin shines again. First, let us dismiss the old saw or canard about Wright’s roofs. Yes, many have leaked, but so have the roofs of countless buildings that Frank Lloyd Wright did not design. The church, which Wright designed in 1956, and which was completed in 1961, two years after he died, is in the midst of a major repair project. The roof has been repaired (no, it had not been leaking, but it had been deteriorating) and the front steps and entry way are being rebuilt. The front steps are integral to the foundation of the building.

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The roof was originally covered in thousands of blue tiles. The tiles started popping off in the extremes of Wisconsin’s weather. and the roof was covered in a blue polyurethane coating. Today, the only remaining tiles are on the arched canopy above the front doors:

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I photographed the roof work in mid-October:

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The church on Saturday December 7:

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The general contractor for the repair work is CG Schmidt, the roofing contractor was F.J.A. Christensen Roofing Company.

While many people think of the church solely as an architectural landmark, it is, of course, primarily a church. In May 2013 I was given the privilege of photographing Good Friday services there. This is a link to those photos:

https://wrightinracine.net/2013/05/04/good-friday-at-annunciation-greek-orthodox-church/

I had been given free rein to photograph the interior of the church a few weeks earlier:

https://wrightinracine.net/2013/04/12/annunciation-greek-orthodox-church-2/ of the

Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church website:

https://www.annunciationwi.org =

John Gurda’s book is the definitive history of the church:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21443265-new-world-odyssey

Please scroll down for previous stories on this website

Remembering Ann MacGregor

Posted on November 23, 2024 by Mark Hertzberg

Photos and text © Mark Hertzberg (2024)

Ann MacGregor one of Mason City, Iowa’s heroes in helping save Frank Lloyd Wright’s last surviving hotel, the Park Inn, and the adjacent City National Bank, died peacefully October 2, it was announced today.

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The hotel and bank buildings, which opened in 1910, had deteriorated so badly that the city had put them up for sale on eBay in the late 1990s or early 2000s. Mason City rallied to save the buildings. Ann served as Executive Director of the newly formed Wright on the Park. Today the Historic Park Inn Hotel is a popular boutique hotel for visitors to Mason City, whether or not they are there on a Wright pilgrimage.

Ann was a genial, giving person. Her obituary outlines her life of service, including as a nurse on the medical ship SS HOPE and as a public health nurse for the Migrant Action Program in the late 1960s in Mason City.

https://www.bratleyfamilyfuneralhomes.com/obituary/ann-macgregor

In 2013 she published a book about her six years service around the world on the HOPE, beginning in 1958 [it is no longer in print]:

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I met Ann in May 2005 when the late Bob (Dr. Robert) McCoy, another one of Mason City’s heroes in saving the hotel and bank building, invited me there to give a talk, and I began photographing the buildings. They were still in a raw state. Ann and I connected in two other ways, one as passionate bicyclists.

The other story tells you quite a bit more about Ann. She began corresponding with Marshall Jones after I told her about his insights into Wright’s work. Jones is serving two consecutive life terms in a Wisconsin prison for a double murder.

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When I interviewed Jones in 2008 for a project about the criminal justice system he told me how much he enjoys reading “anything I can get.” I sent him my Wright in Racine book. He quickly sent me an incisive review back. We began corresponding, in large part about Wright. How much does Jones understand Wright? In addition to Ann being impressed by his insights, the late Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer corresponded with Jones, as well, after I sent Pfeiffer some of Jones’s letters about Wright’s work. When I sent the late Ron McCrea Jones’s review of his Building Taliesin, McCrea wrote me that Jones picked up on a point that no one else had, and he was going to quote him in a talk at Taliesin West. Ann corresponded with Jones for many years, and Jones often wrote me how much he appreciated her letters and friendship. Now I must write him about Ann’s passing.

Ann’s memorial service will be Saturday November 30, as noted in the obituary. I will leave you with a photo of Ann in the bank building in 2010, and of Ann and Bob McCoy she and Wright on the Park were honored with the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy’s prestigious Wright Spirit Award on October 13, 2012, during the group’s annual conference:

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Thank you, Ann, for your friendship and service.

(My remembrance of Bob McCoy is at:

https://wrightinracine.net/tag/bob-mccoy/

Please scroll down for previous posts on this website.

“Photographing Wright” in Chicago

Posted on November 11, 2024 by Mark Hertzberg

Text and photos © Mark Hertzberg (2024)

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A new exhibit related to Frank Lloyd Wright opened two weeks ago at the Driehaus Museum in Chicago. The museum is in the former Gilded Age Nickerson Mansion (1883) on Chicago’s Near North Side, at 50 East Erie Street.

LR IMG_9023.jpg “Photographing Frank Lloyd Wright” is not just another exhibit of Wright’s designs and the stories behind them. Although the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio Foundation published “Frank Lloyd Wright’s Fifty Views of Japan” in 1996, it may not be well known that Wright was an avid photographer early in his career. He had a darkroom at his Home and Studio.

The exhibit features some of his photography, including self portraits, photographs of Hillside Home School, photos of the Home and Studio, and some of the photographs he took in Japan in 1905. There is even one he took of his first wife, Catherine Tobin Wright, reading to one of their sons. The balance of the exhibit on the museum’s second and third floors shows how a variety of noted photographers of his work interpreted his buildings. The photographers featured are Henry Fuermann & Sons, Hedrich-Blessing, Pedro Guerrero, Torkel Korling, Julius Shulman, Ezra Stoller, and Edmund Teske. Fuermann’s 4×5 camera is shown above.

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Put out of your mind the ease of taking pictures today, and take another look at Fuermann’s camera. It used single sheets of film which had to be taken out of the camera after each photograph was taken (unlike my cameras which can take 10 frames a second). Each photograph would be carefully composed. There was no “chimping” (the term photojournalists use to describe their colleagues who quickly look at the screen on the back of the camera to see if they got the image they wanted), each sheet of film had to be developed in the darkroom. The image was reversed on a negative. Photographers get adept at “reading” negatives, but only after making a print did the photographer know for certain if the exposure was correct, and the composition perfect.

LR IMG_9025.jpg The print and negative of a Fuermann photo of Midway Gardens

The timeline of the photographs covers Wright’s career, from photos of students at the first Hillside Home School for his aunts, through to the Guggenheim Museum. A number of the exhibit pieces are from Eric O’Malley’s extraordinary collection, and are shown courtesy of the OA+D (Organic Architecture and Design) archives.

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When people ask me what attracts me to Wright’s work I reply that it is the breadth of it, so one of my favorite parts of the exhibit was in the section devoted to Pedro Guerrero’s work. On the left in the photo below we see the Robert Llewellyn House (1953) in Bethesda, Maryland, and upper right is the Rose Pauson House (1940) near Phoenix. Look at these two photographs taken from the same vantage point (below the house, looking up) and look at how the same photographer recorded the same architect’s different interpretations of a client’s needs a decade apart (the third photo is Guerrero’s photo of the David and Gladys Wright House near Phoenix, 1950). Wright’s vocabulary has changed dramatically, to respond to the program on his drawing board.

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The only negative aspect of the exhibit is that I was surprised to find four significant errors in the text panels accompanying the photographs, this two weeks after it opened. The staff responded graciously when I mentioned the errors, and I expect that they will be corrected.

The exhibit runs through January 5, 2025. While any visit to the Driehaus is worthwhile, this one makes it even more so. Two years ago the museum had a wonderful exhibit dedicated to Richard Nickel and Louis Sullivan. The late Richard H. Driehaus, who restored the Nickerson Mansion, is well known to readers of the National Trust for Historic Preservation magazine, Preservation. Admission is free to visitors who have North American Museum Reciprocity passes.

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Links:

Driehaus Museum:

https://driehausmuseum.org/exhibition/photographing-frank-lloyd-wright

OA+D:

https://oadarchives.org

Frank Lloyd Wright Trust:

https://flwright.org

Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation:

https://franklloydwright.org

National Trust for Historic Preservation:

https://savingplaces.org

Please scroll down for earlier posts on this site

My Wright Eye – September 6, 2024

Posted on September 6, 2024 by Mark Hertzberg

I have just finished helping lead my 17th Road Scholar Frank Lloyd Wright tour. The number is important because it speaks to my challenge to try to find something different to photograph each time I visit a familiar Wright commission. I look for something other than a literal building photo. Here is what I found this week at some of the buildings. They are shown in the order in which we visited the Wisconsin buildings in this Illinois / Wisconsin tour (a link to the itinerary is at the end of the post):

Looking up at the adjoining eaves of two Burnham Block duplexes, Milwaukee:

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Looking up stairway from the basement, Annunciation Greek Orthodox Church

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The roof of the Unitarian Meeting House, Madison, from across the parking lot:

Wyoming Valley School, Spring Green:

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Reflections of east classroom windows in the west classroom window:

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Wyoming Valley School 9.6.24 008.jpg The reflections were visible only when I was seated at a desk, and disappeared when I stood

Assembly Hall, Wyoming Valley School:

Entrance Hall, Wyoming Valley School:

Private dining room, Riverview Terrace Restaurant

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Drafting Room at Hillside:

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Outside the drafting room:

Romeo and Juliet Windmill, as the weather changed:

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Road Scholar Wright Tour:

https://www.roadscholar.org/find-an-adventure/22976/Architectural-Masterworks-of-Frank-Lloyd-Wright

Please scroll down to read previous articles on this website.

The Coda to Hardy House Rehabilitation

Posted on August 28, 2024 by Mark Hertzberg

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When the late Eugene (Gene) Szymczak considered buying Frank Lloyd Wright’s Thomas P. Hardy House in Racine, Wisconsin in 2012 he told me, “I don’t have children. This is something [save the house] I could do for Racine.” Indeed he did. He undertook a heroic rehabilitation and stabilization of the house.* Gene, left of center in the photo below, was awarded the prestigious Wright Spirit Award by the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy for his work on the house in 2015. He died unexpectedly a year later after an illness.

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The house stayed in the family after Gene’s death. Tom Szymczak is one of Gene’s brothers. Tom recently completed a project which, he told me, was the last thing Gene wanted to accomplish at the house. The house was built with two pocket doors. They were replaced by conventional, hinged plain wood doors by the third stewards of the house, David and Mary Archer, between 1947 and 1957:

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Gene decided to put pocket doors back in the house in 2013. He chose sliding glass patio-style doors so he could look into the two courtyards from the entry hall. The heavy metal arms that opened and closed the pocket doors were left in place, and were found in 2013:

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The house was built with leaded glass windows throughout, including in the dramatic two-story living room overlooking Lake Michigan. Anne Ruetz, whose parents were second stewards of the house (1938 – 1947) told me her parents replaced the windows with plain glass ones because the original ones leaked. When Gene put in energy efficient windows he jokingly told me that the next owners of the house could bear the expense of replicating Wright’s window design. Little did he know, of course, that he would be shifting the burden to his brother. 1908 photographs, which are used courtesy of the OA + D Archives, show the original leaded glass living room windows:

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Instead of replicating the design in the living room, Gene intended to have the design fashioned for the pocket doors. The work was completed earlier this month, with window inserts made by Oakbrook Esser of Oconomowoc, Wisconsin. The installation photos show Tom Szymczak, left, and master craftsman Chad Nichols:

Thank you, Gene, for your gift to our community and to the World of Wright!

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The first people outside of family and friends to see the new windows will be 17 members of a Road Scholar Wright tour next Wednesday. They will be followed by several hundred people attending Wright in Wisconsin’s “Wright and Like” tour Saturday September 7.

*The term “rehabilitation” is appropriate, rather than “restoration,” because there were some changes to the house. “Restoration” would infer house museum status, accurate to either the day Hardy moved into the house (1906) or left it (in 1938) after losing it at sheriff’s auction because of monies owed on the house.

Links:

Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy:

www.savewright.org

Wright and Like Tour:

https://wrightinwisconsin.org/wright-and-2024

Road Scholar Architectural Masterworks of Frank Lloyd Wright Tour (run 4 or 5 a year)

https://www.roadscholar.org/find-an-adventure/22976/Architectural-Masterworks-of-Frank-Lloyd-Wright

Please scroll down to read previous posts

Tower Tumult in Bartlesville

Posted on August 14, 2024 by Mark Hertzberg

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The future of Frank Lloyd Wright’s landmark Price Tower in Bartlesville, Oklahoma is uncertain. The Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy has initiated legal proceedings against Cynthia Blanchard, the owner of the building, over her sale of Wright artifacts from the building, including one of the office chairs Wright designed, to a mid-century design dealer in Dallas. The Building Conservancy has an easement on the property, which, it says, prohibits the sale of any of the artifacts.

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Wright designed the tower in 1952 as a combination office and apartment building, and it opened in 1956. The exterior and two-story pinwheel floor plan are derived from Wright’s unrealized design for the St. Mark’s-in-the-Bowery apartment buildings in New York City (1927-1929).*

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The Inn at Price Tower hotel opened in 2003. Blanchard said in a television interview that it was no longer profitable to operate the hotel and its Copper Bar and Restaurant. She announced the closure August 9. Hotel and restaurant employees were laid off and tenants of the building were given notice to move out within 30 days. She said in an interview that the closure is not necessarily permanent, and that she hopes to find a buyer for the building which, she says, is no longer profitable for her to operate.

The photographs are from our stay at the hotel in April 2011. Scott Perkins, who was the Curator of Collections and Exhibitions and at the Price Tower Arts Center, was our host, graciously allowed me to photograph every nook and cranny of the building (he is now Fallingwater’s senior Director of Preservation and Collections).

Oklahoma Frank Lloyd Wright Price Tower 014.JPG This photograph and the one below were taken looking up on the external staircase.

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Oklahoma Frank Lloyd Wright Price Tower 010.JPG Price Tower reflected in a nearby building

Oklahoma Frank Lloyd Wright Price Tower 019.JPG The living room of one of the original apartments

Oklahoma Frank Lloyd Wright Price Tower 018.JPG The sitting room on the lower floor of one of the two-story hotel rooms

One can only hope that my sunset photo of Price Tower was not a harbinger of things to come.

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*While Price Tower was designed around Wright’s idea of a taproot tower, the late Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer told me that it is not a taproot tower because it is tied into the foundation of the adjoining two-story office building. He told me that the SC Johnson Research Tower in Racine is Wright’s only realized taproot tower.

Author’s note: Thank you to the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy for their attention to the tower, and to the Building Conservancy’s John Waters for his editing notes on this article.

Please scroll down for previous posts on this site.

Links:

Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy coverage:

https://savewright.org/endangered-price-tower-in-bartlesville-oklahoma/

Local television coverage:

https://www.newson6.com/story/66b6bcf3e64a7a286feca72e/price-tower-in-bartlesville-closes-due-to-financial-struggles-future-uncertain

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