Architecture Fan? This Is the Wright Place for you!

     Where is the biggest collection of Frank Lloyd Wright structures, commissioned by a single client, located? .... Of course, Lakeland Florida, on the campus of Florida Southern College.  In 1938, Florida Southern College, a private college, had already moved locations a couple of times, because of fire and hurricane damage. The president at the time then had a stroke of genius. After selecting the new site, in Lakeland, a town in central Florida, President Ludd Spivey sent a telegram to the most famous architect in America, Frank Lloyd Wright, then 70 years old and having suffered several personal setbacks. The short missive simply said, " Desire conference with you concerning plans for great educational temple in Florida." Educational temple? That phrase says a lot about President Spivey and about the esteem he held for Wright. (The writing at the bottom of the telegram is Wright's.)

    That telegram and the subsequent meeting established a twenty year partnership between Wright and Spivey, as they worked together to build a totally new, "American" college, abandoning the traditional red brick and ivy-covered walls that dominated most college campuses.  Between 1938 and 1958, Wright (Aged 70-90) designed 18 structures, 12 of which were built, under Wright's direct supervision. The 13th was built in 2013.  Supposedly, Spivey said, "I have no money with which to build the modern American campus, but if you'll design the buildings, I'll work night and day to raise the means."  And Spivey did just that. The student body (just a few hundred at the time, and, during World War II, disproportionately female) was even pressed into action to do much of the building themselves.  In Wright's eyes, he saw buildings rising "out of the ground and into the light, a child of the sun," surrounded by orange groves, slightly rolling hills (very slightly; it is Florida, after all), and overlooking a beautiful lake. Wright devoted the last 20 years of his life to the project, dying in 1959. Over the years, the college has expanded, of course, but all of the construction since 1958 has been carefully overseen by Wright's former apprentices and architects who are firmly ground in the Wright style. 

    In 2013, a visitors center was built (in a Sears and Roebuck catalog kit house), and the college started offering tours of the campus. My wife and I took the 2 and a half hour tour recently, and it was incredible. We had a fantastic tour guide name Carol, a retired teacher and college employee, whose knowledge and love of the campus were almost palpable.  The first stop was the faculty house next door to the visitors center. Wright had envisioned a couple of dozen of these usonian homes on the outskirts of the campus, but none was built before his death. In 2013, one was built as a model home (the 13th Wright structure to be built), at a cost of $1.3 million.  It had all the details you'd expect from a Wright home:  compressed, claustrophobic spaces opening into tall spaces, horizontal lines, custom designed furniture,  tall glass windows opening up onto nature, and every screw head pointed in the same direction.

    From there, it was onto the campus proper, and to the outdoor structures that Wright designed between buildings, the esplanades, partially covered walkways, following the hills and with pillars designed to be abstract orange trees. 

    The focal point and gathering place of the campus was designed to be a giant fountain and pool called the Water Dome. The Water Dome is a circular arrangement of jets blasting watery arcs into the air, creating a bundt cake effect as tour guide Carol called it. The fountain only operates at 30% capacity today during limited hours. On one or two special occasions a year, the fountain operates at 100%, creating 45 feet high arcs. Even though he designed it, Wright never saw it in operation himself. The technology that makes it work was developed after his death, but he insisted that it be built anyway. 

    On the other side of the Water Dome are the two chapels, the Annie Pfeiffer and the Danforth. Both were beautiful and serene, and unique.

(Pfeiffer)

 (Danforth)

    The tour also includes the Science Building, the original Library, Administration Building, and Seminar buildings.

(interior of original library)

    We highly recommend this tour.  It was incredible, and we learned so much.  For more information, here is the website https://www.flsouthern.edu/frank-lloyd-wright/home.aspx .

Pieced and Patterned in St. Petersburg, Florida

     Are you planning  a fall or winter trip to the St. Petersburg/Clearwater/Tampa Bay area of Florida? You can't spend all your time on the beach, right? The Museum of Fine Arts in St. Petersburg has an awesome exhibit that you shouldn't miss if you are interested in history and/or quilting. It's called Pieced and Patterned: American Quilts, 1800-1930.  There are more than thirty quilts on display, all beautiful and full of history.  The exhibit is open through January 23, 2020.  Check out the Museum's webpage at https://mfastpete.org/

    Every quilt is a masterpiece, and the effort that went into making each one is mindblowing.  Among my favorites were the crazy quilts, so-called because they were made of scraps or irregularly cut pieces of fabric, with no discernable overall pattern.  Sometimes, the quiltmakers added random appliques or buttons or other materials, and they often used silks or velvets, fabrics usually not found in utilitarian quilts. Crazy quilts were became popular in the 1880s.

    Other quilts reflect the more detailed and tedious aspects of quiltmaking, displaying elaborate patterns or artistic stitchwork for example.  And when I say tedious, I mean tedious.  Look at this postage stamp quilt, for example. The fabric squares are literally cut to the size of postage stamps. Can you imagine the work?

(detail)

(full quilt)

    

(Snake pattern, popular in Florida in 1920sand 1930s. The fabric that comprises the snakes is printed flour sack material.)

    I even learned from the exhibit that quilt patterns even reflected a family's political loyalties.  The motif on the left above is called the "Whig rose" and was popular in the 1830s and early 1840s. On the right, the pattern is called "Whig's defeat," in reference to the 1844 election in which Whig Henry Clay was defeated by Democrat James K. Polk.

    

    When you've seen the quilts, be sure to check out the rest of the museum's collections. The museum is not large, but it has a beautiful selection of representative objects from a multitude of times and places.

The Museum of the American Arts and Crafts Movement

     Yay! It's open --- finally! St. Petersburg Florida continues on its trajectory of becoming a world class city of museums with the opening of the Museum of the American Arts and Crafts Movement  ( https://www.museumaacm.org/about.html ), the only museum in America dedicated to the architectural and artistic Arts and Crafts Movement during the period 1890 to 1930.  After years of delay, the museum finally opened on September 7, 2021, and it is a very worthy addition to a city that already boasts The Dali, the James Museum of Western Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, and the Florida Holocaust Museum, just to name a few.

    Like the James and the Dali, the MAACM started as a collector and philanthropist's private collection.  In this case, Rudy Ciccarello created the Two Red Roses Foundation and oversaw the design and construction of the Museum to exhibit some 2,000 objects that are a part of the Foundation's collection.

 "Ciccarello, along with Alfonso Architects, designed and oversaw the incredible task of creating the Museum of the American Arts and Crafts Movement in St. Petersburg, Florida. The five-story, 137,000 square-foot museum is a work of art itself, with incredible architectural elements such as a grand atrium, skylights, and a dramatic spiral staircase—all adorned with period art, light fixtures, windows, fireplaces, and more. MAACM features more than 40,000 square feet of gallery space, as well as a destination restaurant with private dining rooms, a retail store, an upscale café, a children’s gallery, a reference library, a theater, a graphic studio, a beautiful event space for weddings and corporate events, and an outdoor green space enhanced by original period tiles and fountains." (About the museum: Museum of the American Arts & Crafts Movement. About the Museum | Museum of the American Arts & Crafts Movement. (n.d.). Retrieved September 12, 2021, from https://www.museumaacm.org/about.html.)

    The architecture is stunning. Shapes, construction materials, and construction methods clearly reflect the contents of the museum, relying heavily on the use of wood and ceramics or pottery. Each floor is devoted to a different medium, for example, lighting on one floor, tile and pottery on one floor, furniture and architectural elements on another, etc. There are also a couple of galleries of photographs of the period, including several by well known photographers Alfred Stieglitz and Edward S. Curtis, and a gallery of children's books illustrations. Interspersed throughout the museum are a few rooms, taken from grand houses and re-created for visitors to enjoy. Even visitors who are not experts on the movement may recognize famous names, like Newcomb and Rookwood in pottery, Stickley in furniture, Tiffany in lighting, and Louis Sullivan and Frank Lloyd Wright in architecture. 

    It's hard to pick a favorite gallery; I enjoyed them all, especially the pottery and lighting. However, my favorite peace in the whole museum is not even Arts and Crafts Movement, strictly speaking. It's the Arlyn table, created in 1988 by George Nakashima, from a redwood slab. Nakishma had developed his woodworking skills while incarcerated in a Japanese-American internment camp as a boy.

    A couple of months ago, we were among the museum members given sneak preview tours of the museum. Of course, we had to promise not to talk about the preview, and we were not allowed to take photos. I have to admit that, after the tour, I kind of doubted whether the museum would be a thriving one; I wondered if people would make return visits. A few months later, I've changed my mind. There were quite a few visitors on Saturday, and they all seemed very interested, and I overheard snatches of really lively conversations. The MAACM is a worthy addition to St. Petersburg's museum life, and I think it will find its audience.