Hi-De-Ho Rene,

I'm not breaking new ground in the blogosphere with this posting, as we have seen a whirlwind of Frank Lloyd Wright criticism and defense and somewhat-related "what is art?" stuff whipping around the web. Most of what I've read has focused on Wright's residential projects or, more entertainingly, on his big-as-all-outdoors ego.

I had a chance this weekend to see a Frank Lloyd Wright commercial project, the H.C. Price Tower in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, or as Wright subtitled it, "The Tree That Escaped the Crowded Forest."



(Others might call it "The Game of Jenga That Went Wildly Out of Control." The photo is of the 221-foot tower under construction.)

It's actually a very interesting building, attractive and really quite evocative of the lone tree on the prairie it was to represent. At 19 stories it's the only skyscraper Wright completed.

Wright had conceived of the design in the '20s for a different application in New York City, but it wasn't until the 1950s that he had a chance to build it. It was completed in 1956, and there are design elements that are very '50s-ish in it, but like most Wright buildings, it evokes his style more than any particular era's.

It's a building of angles upon angles, narrow passages and a mixture of very low and very high ceilings. It has trapped, unusable spaces, but also glorious views. It's cantilevered, and you get the sensation that the floors dip down slightly toward the corners. (The sensation was confirmed by a leak that ran to a pool of water in a corner of the Price family apartment.) The elevators are tiny (the four shafts also served as "taproots" to anchor the building) -- no more than four people can fit in one of the three in operation, and the stairs are exterior. Wright did not allow for a freight elevator, so all the furniture had to be built on-site.

The furniture itself is gosh-awful. Some of the built-in stuff remains in all its thinly veneered plywood glory. The Jetsons-like chairs he designed for the office levels are proudly displayed in the building's museum, but in real life they lasted just two weeks in operation and were replaced by standard 1950s-issue office chairs.

On the subject of leaks -- and Wright's ego: I went to the Price Tower with a friend whose mother had worked for the H.C. Price Company when the tower was built. H.C. Price's office was on the top floor. My friend's mother tells the story that, within a week of moving in, a leak developed almost exactly in the middle of the room. Frustrated to find a pool of water on his desk, Price called Wright to complain. "Frank, there's a leak right above my desk," Price barked. "What can we do about that?" Wright replied: "Move the desk." (The problem with the story is that the desk was, of course, built-in.)

I'll avoid the "Is architecture art?" question and stick to the more prosaic, "Does architecture have to function well to be great?" At what point does a grand concept become a grand failure? Not to say the Price Tower was a failure -- it was used as an office building for almost 30 years and is now a museum and boutique hotel. But it did cost almost twice as much as budgeted to build, found ways to waste space despite the tight quarters, and still leaks.

I'll leave you to ponder it as I prepare for an evening of Mars-watching (finally, the clouds have parted).

Later,
Kari