Taliesin West — Image by kenne
don’t have a “bucket list,” however, going to Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin West in Scottsdale, Arizona would be on the list if I did. As a child, I wanted to be an architect when I grew up, and one of my favorite architects was Frank Lloyd Wright. As a young adult and living in northern Illinois, it was easy to visit Wright’s home, Taliesin, near Green Spring, Wisconsin, which I did back in the ’60s. This past weekend, we visited Taliesin West, considered one of Wright’s greatest masterpieces, a showcase of his ability to integrate indoor and outdoor spaces.
Wright, recognized as the 20th century’s greatest architect, decided in the early 1930’s to build a winter home in the desert after suffering an illness during one of Wisconsin’s cold winters. After purchasing 550 acres 26 miles northwest of Phoenix, and with the help of his apprentice, Wright began work on Taliesin West, “. . . gathering rocks from the desert floor and sand from the washes to build his desert masterpiece.” From then on, he would spend winters at Taliesin West, summers at Taliesin.
Not long after building Taliesin West, which served as a living, working and educational facility, Wright became annoyed by power lines and the growth of Scottsdale near his desert masterpiece, so much so that he considered moving to Sabino Canyon, northeast of Tucson. However, his wife, Olga, was not willing to start living in a tent again, so the move never took place — too bad, since Sabino Canyon would have provided a much more beautiful setting for Taliesin West.
“Our new desert camp belonged to the Arizona desert as though it had stood there during creation.” — Frank Lloyd Wright
kenne
Click here to see complete (30 images)photo slideshow.
Brief Slideshow by kenne
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Reblogged this on Becoming is Superior to Being and commented:
Thought I would reblog this September 13, 2011 posting of one of my favorite sites in the Scottsdale, Arizona area. — kenne