Whoppah explores: Frank Lloyd Wright

Each building as a “complete work of art”

While many will remember Frank Lloyd Wright as an architect, Wright's interest was not limited to architecture alone. From furniture design to lighting and glassware, Wright aspired to turn each of his prairie homes into a 'complete work of art'. Here too, Wright applied the same principle as with the exterior of his buildings: the environment and function were leading for the design. Although Wright developed a lot of furniture, chairs were his most sought after designs. For example, he designed heavy oak furniture with stately, vertical shapes – simplistic, but revolutionary for the time. He later experimented with slimmer and futuristic shapes – the forerunners of modern, minimalist furniture design.

A few pieces of most designs appeared, but in 1955 Wright collaborated with the Heritage Henredon furniture partnership on a collection for the American middle class market. This “Taliesin Collection”, with a lot of oak and straight shapes, did not catch on at the time, because it did not fit with the then current styles such as space age, which made extensive use of plastic. Nowadays these items are real collector's items. Lucky you if you can pick one up!