THE GEIGER DATABASE

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Frank Lloyd Wright commissions

Frank Lloyd Wright Commission Titles

The information presented here exhibits the extent to which John Geiger considered many points of reference related to a given Frank Lloyd Wright project. Aside from basic information such as title, location, and project date, Geiger extended his interests to types of floor and roof plans, types of construction and building purpose, and where possible the dates of the various stages of development in the design process and construction. Geiger often included citations for bibliographic references as sources for the recorded information in an elaborate but unevenly developed series of attributions.

Project Information

Country House for Mr. and Mrs. Herbert F. Johnson, "Wingspread" [Racine, Wisconsin] (1937)

Note: The following information concerning this project represents original research and analysis by John Geiger, and is based in his long and detailed study of the Frank Lloyd Wright literature as well as personal contacts with members of the Taliesin Fellowship and architectural historians. In addition, he added his own categories of building type and compositional form, as well as other points of consideration that he deemed important to understanding of the design. As with any primary archival source material, the references and sources of attribution should be consulted where possible to affirm the data provided. Sometimes there is an indication of attribution for which there is no matching footnote recorded. Some understanding of the intended source may be discovered in remaining notes or frequently cited publications which appear in the comment field.

Name of client: Johnson, Herbert F..

Sobriquet or alternative place name: Wingspread.

Design Status (as of 2011): Executed.

Occupancy form or use: HOUSING/Residential/Single Family.

Principal building materials: MASONRY/Brick, lapped boards.

Number of drawings for this project detailed in the database: 30.

Drawing Number and Description

3703.??1     Floor Plan probably for Hitchcock
3703.001     Aerial perspective towards master/children quadrant
3703.002     Perspective from children/parent quadrant
3703.003     Perspective towards entry quadrant
3703.004     Floor plan; very early with work by Wright
3703.005     Elevation living room roof, section of same and section masterBR
3703.008     Elevation of parent/children quadrant, early study
3703.009     Aerial perspective of parent/children quadrant, early study
3703.010     Perspective from parent/children quadrant, early study
3703.013     Floor plan
3703.014     Site and floor plan
3703.014     Site plan
3703.016     Cross section
3703.023     Floor plan
3703.029     Perspective from below of parent/children quadrant, early study
3703.033     Very early conceptual site and floor plan by Wright
3703.047     Cross section of living room
3703.052     Elevations from Southeast and Southwest
3703.059     Exterior board details
3703.060     Sash schedle
3703.062     LIving roon clerestory detail
3703.066     Cross section main module
3703.071     Clerestory detail
3703.072     Corridor sash
3703.075     Floor plan main module, furniture study
3703.076     Elevations
3703.078     Roof framing plan
3703.079     Roof plan
3703.151     Interior perspective
3703.161     Furniture for living room

Individuals recorded as contributing to project:

Note: Not everyone who contributed to a project may be named; only those whose participation has been confirmed from a source appear above. Occasionally names presented as contributors to a project may seem chronologically anomalous. This usually occurs when an individual prepared drawings for publicity, exhibition, or publication long after the original date of a commission.

Individuals recorded as producing drawings for this project:
Howe, John
Wright, Frank Lloyd

Construction supervision: Lautner, John

Roof type: GableFlat.

Note: Records a category devised by Geiger to classify the types of roof structure found in Frank Lloyd Wright projects. These terms were applied consistently through a choice list on Column [ROOFTYPE] in Table MMTFDRAWINGS FILE, and may be searched.

Project Drawing Date Range

Note: Dates for preliminary and working drawings, as well as the start and completion of construction, appear here only when present in the database. Through careful study of original, reproduced, or published Wright drawings, John Geiger developed an elaborate granulation for design process dates and their attributions. Such information is largely available only for Wright projects dating from the mid-1930s until 1959.

Date recorded by John Geiger for chronological sorting: 1/15/1937.

Notes and References

Comments by John Geiger and/or sources of attribution: (1) See drawing 3703.004 signed this date. Geiger 05/15/96 (a) Lautner says he did most of the plans (working drawings) for S. C. Johnson and Son Company. John Lautner, Architect, Frank Escher, p. 23. Geiger 03/22/06.

Note: The information shown above is collected from a series of data table columns intended originally to record not only comments or notes, but also to cite sources of attribution for dates assigned to the various stages of drawing preparation in the design process. As with any primary archival source material, the references and sources of attribution shown here should be consulted where possible to affirm the data provided.

This commission is referenced and/or illustrated in the following publications:

Aguar, Charles E. and Berdeanna. Wrightscapes: Frank Lloyd Wright''s Landscape Designs. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Drexler, Arthur. The Drawings of Frank Lloyd Wright. New York: Horizon Press. [ISBN: 0-8180-0019-8].
Kaufmann, Jr., Edgar. Frank Lloyd Wright: Drawings for a Living Architecture. New York: Horizon Press.
Lipman, Jonathan, and Levine, Neil. The Wright State: Frank Lloyd Wright In Wisconsin. Milwaukee, Wisconsin: Milwaukee Art Museum.
Pfeiffer, Bruce Brooks. Frank Lloyd Wright: The Masterworks. New York: Rizzoli. [ISBN: 0-8478-1715-6].
Pfeiffer, Bruce Brooks. Frank Lloyd Wright Drawings: Masterworks from the Frank Lloyd Wright Archives. New York: Harry H. Abrams Inc.. [ISBN: 0-8108-1773-4].
Pfeiffer, Bruce Brooks. Frank Lloyd Wright Monograph 1936-1941 (Volume 6). Tokyo: A. D. A. Edita. [ISBN: 4-87140-517-6].
Pfeiffer, Bruce Brooks. Frank Lloyd Wright Monograph Preliminary Studies, 1933-1959 (Volume 11). Tokyo: A. D. A. Edita. [ISBN: 4-87140-522-2].
Pfeiffer, Bruce Brooks. Frank Lloyd Wright Monograph, In His Renderings 1887-1959 (Volume 12). Tokyo: A. D. A. Edita. [ISBN: 4-87140-523-0].
Pfeiffer, Bruce Brooks. Frank Lloyd Wright: The Complete Works 1917-1942 (Volume 2). Cologne, Germany: Taschen. [ISBN: 978-3-8365-0926-8].
Riley, Terence and Reed, Peter (editors). Frank Lloyd Wright, Architect. New York: The Museum of Modern Art. [ISBN: 0-87070-642-X].
Wright, Frank Lloyd. Frank Lloyd Wright: Architectural Forum (January, 1938). Boston, Mass.: Rogers and Manson Co..
Wright, Frank Lloyd. Frank Lloyd Wright: Collected Writings Volume 3 1931-1939. New York: Rizzoli. [ISBN: 0-8478-1699-O].