history

  • The Battle for Taliesin

    Directionsbern1650Fred Bernstein has written an excellent short article – more of a timeline, really – on a recent on-line battle for a set of tremendously important photographs of Taliesin, taken just before the original structure burned down in 1914. And unlike that story, this one ends happily, albeit quite expensively.

    On Jan. 24, a Monday night, Jack Holzhueter learned that 32 photographs
    of Taliesin – Frank Lloyd Wright’s home and studio in Spring Green,
    Wis. – were for sale on eBay. Mr. Holzhueter, on the board of curators
    of the Wisconsin Historical Society, looked at the Web site and
    realized that the photos were exceedingly rare. "They’re a Rosetta
    stone for the building," he said: they were taken in 1911 and 1912;
    Taliesin burned in 1914 and was rebuilt in somewhat different form. Mr.
    Holzhueter, a retired writer and, he says, "full-time patsy," told his
    colleagues, "We’ve got to do something about this." The auction would
    end at 9:17, Central time, on Friday night, Jan. 28.

  • Edwin Lutyens

    Lutyensnapoleonchair

    A greatly admired craftsman whose masterworks contrasted – at least in the public imagination of the time – with his somewhat unorthodox public persona and his terrific sense of humor, Edwin Lutyens was an architect, furniture designer, populist and great joke-teller. Often said to be the single person most responsible for the planning and construction of New Delhi’s entire city center (and the master plan that was followed in that city well into the 1970s), Lutyens is perhaps best known today for the Viceroy’s House, a particularly impressive landmark which is now the Rashtrapati Bhavan, the official residence of the President of India. Lutyens is also responsible for St. Jude’s, one of the prettiest churches in the UK . Dozens of his finest structures still stand today in London and elsewhere. His influence to the Arts & Crafts movement is, unfortunately, often under-reported. His skill at integrating monumental scale and classical motif with the simple and straightforward, and his tremendous respect for the craftspeople who worked under him and a very strong belief in the importance of craft and handwork frequently made its way into the details of his buildings. Candia Lutyens continues the family business with her design firm in London today; she specializes in building many items of furniture designed by her grandfather, work that was shadowed by his more well-known skill as architect.

  • 7 Hammersmith Terrace

    Home of "typographer and antiquary" Sir Emery Walker from 1903-1933, 7 Hammersmith Terrace will be, for the first (and possibly last) time, open to the public – but only from April to July 2005. #7 is one in a row of seventeen tall, narrow homes built between 1755 and 1800 near Chiswick Mall in Hammersmith, London. The house has been preserved, replete with much of the contents of Walker’s personal collections, which included textiles by William Morris (some of which came from Morris’ own Kelmscott House, not far away), furniture – much of it from the collection of the great Philip Webb, a close friend of Walker’s and William Morris’ and considered one of the founders of the English Arts & Crafts Movement, and many well-preserved examples of textiles, ceramic, metal & woodwork made in the Arts & Crafts tradition. If you are in or near London, please try to visit one of the underrated gems of the movement, and consider donating a sum to help the preservation and conservation of the home and Walker’s collections.

  • ellsworthstorey.com

    StoreywindowsBorn in Chicago in 1879, Ellsworth Storey grew up to become one of the most important architects of Seattle. He was influenced very strongly by the Arts & Crafts movement (Frank Lloyd Wright’s own Chicago Arts & Crafts Society was instrumental in Storey’s early socialization as an architect), but integrated a a wide variety of European and North African styles into his work. The strong influence of the Swiss chalet-style home is especially noticeable in many of the Seattle residences he designed.

    Recently, Hillel decided to document his own passion – the Ellsworth Storey house he owns – and his recent hobby, the life and work of the man who built it. If you live in the Northwest, you probably already know about Storey’s influence and have seen some of his houses; if not, take a few minutes to visit ellsworthstorey.com and learn about a tremendously underappreciated American craftsman.
     

  • Los Rios Historic District

    SjcmonplqOrange County contains some of the best-maintained and -restored examples of Mission Revival architecture in the United States. The best example of this style is San Juan Capistrano’s Los Rios Historic District, which also happens to be the oldest continually-occupied residential neighborhood in the state – and one of the oldest in the country. Montanez Adobe (which some folks say is haunted), built in 1794, is open for tours, and the area’s other historic adobes are lived in to this day – the 10th generation of the Rios family lives in one of them. The O’Neill Museum is also worth a visit when you are in the area. A number of small shops, galleries and restaurants fill the 18th and 19th century wooden homes of Los Rios; take a walking tour of the area and explore at your own pace.

  • Review: Byrdcliffe Traveling Exhibit

    ByrdcliffelogoOur friend Keith Wiesinger, founder of the Wilson Crafts
    Guild, had the opportunity to visit the Byrdcliffe traveling exhibit recently and was kind of enough to forward us a short review:

    The Byrdcliffe Colony is a very unique tidbit in American
    arts and crafts history. It started in 1902 and exists in an altered
    form even today. I think that the colony was in some ways the most
    direct transfer of William Morris’s ideals and designs into the
    American marketplace at the turn of the century. The colony started
    largely by imitating Morris spirit and design queues. The traveling
    exhibit is excellent but I recommend some prep before you travel to see
    it.

  • Sotheby’s: Greene & Greene

    GreenelightRich Muller notes that "many of the pieces that have been in the Huntington’s Scott gallery are now up for auction (through Sotheby’s). There are a lot of high-resolution images that I’ve never seen anywhere else. Get your checkbooks out, or at least download some of these images!  There is also information on each lot." Catalogs are US$43; the least expensive item up for auction is significantly more expensive.

    Of special note, at least to those interested in the graphic arts: some of the most expensive cuts (of such a small size, at least) ever.

  • Wright’s Carr Home Destroyed

    FlwdemolishOn November 8, an 88-year old Frank Lloyd Wright-designed house in Grand Rapids, Michigan was demolished to make room for a new single-family home. The Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy would have preferred to save the home from demolition, but not made aware of the demolition plans until after the building had been torn down. According to Wright scholars and others who examined the property, however, the house was in especially bad shape and restoring it would have been a very serious undertaking. William Allin Storrer, author of The Frank Lloyd Wright Companion, said of the property:

    The building deserved to be torn down,
    and crying over its destruction brings to mind the story of the
    shepherd boy who cried ‘wolf’ once too often. We must
    preserve that of Wright which truly represents his organic
    architectural principles, and the W.S. Carr house did not even when
    built, though it had the master’s signature on the plan.

    photograph: Kevin Byrd / Associated Press / Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy