Frank Lloyd Wright’s Design
The Guggenheim Museum in New York is home of one of the world’s greatest collections of modern art. And fittingly, the building itself is a work of modern art.
Instead of the traditional rectangular building with various flat floors, architect Frank Lloyd Wright designed the museum as a six-story, circular, glass-domed structure with a spiral ramp surrounding a hollow core. This means art viewers can take the elevator to the top of the building and walk down the ramp to the bottom. There are no stairs to climb, no masses of rooms to get lost in, and no chance of missing a single piece of art.
The Guggenheim — designed in 1943, but not completed until 1960 — was one of the last major projects in Wright’s remarkable architectural career.
Wright was born in Richland Center, Wisconsin, and studied engineering at the University of Wisconsin. After working as a draftsman, he set out on his own. His designs followed the work of other modern architects in rejecting the highly-ornamented design of the previous century, in favor of simplicity. These architects believed that the form of a building should harmonize with its function.
Much of Wright’s early work is in what is called “Prairie Style.” Buildings designed in this fashion reflect the flatness of the prairie in their low, horizontal appearance. Many of these structures were built in the Chicago area. Though he designed several commercial buildings, such as the Johnson Wax building in Racine, Wisconsin, one of his most famous works is the “Fallingwater” house on Bear Creek near Uniontown, Pennsylvania. Fallingwater is a low, horizontal house that incorporates a waterfall into the design.