Architectural Gems: Wisconsin: Part One

I recently spent a week on a Road Scholar trip and the next few posts will share that trip with you. Lake Geneva, Wisconsin served as the home base for the trip. The travel plan included several visits to a few of the architectural highlights of southern Wisconsin. Two locations I have especially wanted to visit were on the agenda; the Milwaukee Art Museum and the Frank Lloyd Wright home at Taliesin. The weather was delightfully cool after the intensity of this summer in the mid-west and elsewhere. I got to check two more things off my list of "things to do while I can". 

We stayed at Covenant Harbor, a conference and retreat center on the shore of Geneva Lake. I went up from Bloomington a day early so I could explore the area before our program started.

Sunday afternoon on Geneva Lake with clear skies and low humidity.

There is a footpath around the entire 26 miles of Geneva Lake. The community of Lake Geneva really developed as a result of the Great Chicago Fire. The "well to do" folks had summer residences on the lake and while their "estates" were being rebuilt in Chicago, they lived in their Lake Geneva "estates".

The footpath leading from Covenant Harbor to the downtown area of Lake Geneva.

Later in the week we took a short boat ride around part of the lake for a view of some of the real estate that people call their "summer residence". Each one with its own boat dock and manicured green grass.

This building dates back a ways and at one time was the summer residence of one family from Chicago. The tour guide gave us a run down of the many incarnations of the building over the years. Most recently it was divided into condos...a sign of the times.

I walked different sections of the foot path and was stopped in my tracks a number of times when I came around a corner upon some monster piece of real estate...a "how the other half lives" experience. 


FIRST STOP: TALIESIN AT SPRING GREEN, WISCONSIN

Frank Lloyd Wright was born in the valley of the Wisconsin River about 20 miles from the site of Taliesin.  In 1911 he began what would be a life long project of building his home/estate. During our visit the setting was brilliant under the August sun. Wright gave it the Welsh name Taliesin, meaning “shining brow.” Frank Lloyd Wright placed Taliesin on the brow of a hill and the predominant inclusion of widows, many floor to ceiling, throughout the house created the feeling of being part of the landscape.

Wright was a proponent of "Organic Architecture", a philosophy of blending the building with the landscape of the site.

“Bring out the nature of materials, always let their nature intimately into your scheme. Strip the wood of varnish and greasy paint, let it alone or stain it. Develop the natural texture of the plastering and stain it. Reveal the nature of the wood, plaster, brick or stone in your designs; they are all by nature friendly and beautiful....” Frank Lloyd Wright, Collected Writings,

 

Windows Everywhere!

 The take away idea from the tour and being present at Taliesin was that Wright believed that structures could elevate the lives of the individuals living, learning and working in them, leading each person to fulfill his or her potential. Although we could not take photographs inside the residence, the interior space and decoration certainly enhanced this idea.

NEXT STOP: MILWAUKEE ART MUSEUM

Thanks for looking.