Movin' to PA

Chicago Tribune architecture critic Blair Kamin recently published two pieces covering the preservation of a Frank Lloyd Wright house in Lisle, Illinois, last Friday and again yesterday.



After mounting an unsuccessful print campaign to disturb the renovation of Soldier Field by da Mayor and Boston firm Wood + Zapata, Kamin - this city's sole newspaper architecture critic - is back promoting a preservationist cause. Not that there's anything wrong with that in and of itself, but the double coverage of a minor Wright house being transported to Pennsylvania seems less a reason to rejoice than it appears.



As I mentioned the house is one of Wright's many minor works, a prefabricated house built in Lisle in 1957. Some Wright scholars contest that the architect's hand in many of these jobs may have been minimal, so saying that every design that came out of Wright's office is equal and deserves preservation does not make sense.



In my opinion the house does not deserve the attention, though the attention goes along with the intentions of the new owner, Johnstown, PA. The small town (pop. 23,906) will use the house as an educational center focusing on 20th century art and architecture. Although I admire the eventual use as beneficial to the public, the ultimate goal is tourism. Pennsylvania will soon be home to three FLLW houses within close proximity to each other, the most notable of the existing two being Fallingwater, a house perched over a waterfall that people all over the world come to see, which recently reopened after major structural repairs. Why not visit Johnstown and see that other house?



But what the preservation and move of this house signals is the power of celebrity, and the biggest celebrity in architecture has been dead for almost 35 years. Architecture has living celebrities like Frank Gehry, Daniel Libeskind and Santiago Calatrava, but none of them come close to Wright's name recognition or celebrity status. And it might be a while before another architect steps ahead of Wright in those factors, since the sheer drama of his life and his personal reputation appeal as much to people as his buildings. In other words, he was an all-around celebrity with lots of dirt to be dug up, keeping him on the front page. Good buildings don't get somebody on the front page.



Architects tend to have a love/hate relationship with Wright, me included. I love many of his designs and think he rightly deserves his status as one of the greatest architects, but I hate the way his life is being used by benefactors and preservationists and the lingering effects of his egomaniacal ways on the profession and its perception to the public.