HOUSES BY Sir F.L.WRIGHT

B.HARLEY BRADLEY HOUSE

ROBIE HOUSE

Frederick C. Robie House

Built : 1909

Location : Chicago, Illinois

Style : Prairie Style

Climate : Temperate

ConstructionSystem : Brick and Steel

Prairie Style

Low Pitched Roof

Central Chimney

Overhanging Eaves

Horizontal Lines

Open Floor Plan

• Victorian era homes were boxed-in and confining.

• Prairie Style houses had designs with low horizontal lines and open interior spaces.

• Rooms were often divided by leaded glass panels.

• Furniture was either built-in or specially designed.

• Prairie houses were designed to blend in with the

flat, prairie landscape.

The Creator’s Words:

"Architecture is the triumph of human imagination over materials, methods and men, to put man into possession of his own earth.

Bring out the nature of the materials, let their nature intimately into your scheme....Reveal the nature of the wood, plaster, brick or stone in your designs; they are all by nature friendly and beautiful."

The house was designed for Frederick C. Robie, a bicycle manufacturer, who did not want a

home done in the typical Victorian style. Robie

desired a modern floorplan and

needed a garage, and a playroom for children. He also required that his home be

fire-proof, yet retained an open floor plan free of closed, box-like rooms that would prevent the uniformity of decoration and

design.

Concept

Horizontal Lines :

• shows movement

• utilizes a form to create space

• dramatizes the structure

• juxtaposition to surrounding landscape

• great visual appeal to a pedestrian

• establishing a relationship between form and function

Privacy Wright recognised a house as

a place for solitude and comfort thus provided an

entrance secluded away from the street

The perimeter wall surrounding the house, or the low ceilings and

high walls, wright made the house applicable for

a private space for its tenants.

Spaces

• Indoor spaces should not be closed and isolated from each other, but they should open into each other thus establishing the

difference between "defined spaces" and "closed spaces".

• The interior space should be fluid and transparent,

allowing the entry of light. This "explosion of the box" produces the effect of walls unfolding to reveal large, vast spaces.

• The house is divided into two wings, keeping the public areas toward the street and the service areas near the innermost sections of the house.

G-Floor Plan

A game room and billiard room make up this level, separated by a fireplace. In both spaces, Wright chose to showcase the system of structural beams in the ceiling, to give a greater sense of altitude to the rooms. This level also houses the utility equipment, laundry, pantry space, and a 3-car garage. Access to the house is at this level, with access to the main living area via stairs.

G+1 Floor Plan

The space is divided into two areas, the living and dining areas separated by the fireplace, but visually connected.

On both ends of this space the two long galleries form triangular areas that are more intimate, for relaxing or eating.

G+2 Floor Plan

The bedrooms are at this level, overlooking the house in a sort of tower-style.

Compositional method

• organizing symmetric forms in

asymmetric groupings.

• a long two-story block, with apparently symmetrical porches, each

featuring a sloped roof, at each end.

• The symmetry is an illusion, because the elevated terrace of the western end of the house is balanced by the wall of the courtyard to opening to service the eastern end.

Structural Elements

• Projecting cantilevered roof eaves, continuous bands of art-glass windows, and the use of Roman brick emphasize the horizontality.

• To further emphasize the horizontal of the bricks, the horizontal joints were

filled with a cream-colored mortar and the small vertical joints were filled

with brick-coloured mortar.

Exterior

• From a distance an impression of

continuous lines of

horizontal colour.

• A largely steel structure, which accounts for the

minimal deflection of the eaves.

• The planter urns, copings, lintels, sills and other exterior trim work are of

Bedford limestone.

• The design of the art glass windows is an abstract pattern of coloured and clear glass

using Wright's favourite 30 and 60-degree angles.

Interiors

Entrance HallwayThe low ceiling before the

front door marked the transition between the

exterior and the interior.

The dining room space was defined primarily through its

furnishings.

Living Room

Fireplace

Art Glass

Lighting: The main level of the house relies on both natural and

artificial lighting.

Kitchen

B. HARLEY BRADLEY HOUSE701 South Harrison Avenue, Kankakee, Kankakee County, Illinois

PRAIRIE STYLE

Basement Plan

PLANS

First Floor

Second Floor

InteriorsFlooring: Main House with stained quarter sawn oak. The stable has a concrete slab covered with carpet2nd floor of the stable is wood and is covered with carpet.

Walls and ceiling finish: The walls in the main house are all plaster with a fresco finish. The living room, entry areas and dining room all have elaborate false beamsand are finished with matching plaster.The stable walls and ceilings are coveredwith stained pine bead board.

STAIRS

DINING ROOM

MAIN ENTRANCEFROM INSIDE

CABINET DESKS

ART GLASS WINDOWS

B. HARLEY BRADLEY HOUSE IN WINTER

Wright’s Prairie Style Wright’s Prairie houses, designed between 1900 and 1916, broke with the fashionable American taste for homes in a European revival style.

Fashionable Victorian villa typical of the time F.L. Wright, Ward Willets House, Chicago, 1902

Oriented to the street with frontal entrance Set back from the street with hidden Wrap-around porch with decorative ironwork Broad eves, balconies merge interior/exterior

Tall sash windows with shutters Bands of casement windows set under eves

Steep-pitched roofs, gables, several tall chimneys Low-pitched hipped roofs, broad central chimney Vertical, compact emphasis, unrelated to site Low, spreading, horizontal. Integrated with

site.

References : • http://littledoseofevy.blogspot.in

• http://en.wikiarquitectura.com/index.php/Robie_House

• http://www.greatbuildings.com/buildings/Robie_Residence.html

• http://gowright.org/MoodleWright/mod/book/view.php?id=59&chapterid=18

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robie_House

THANK YOU