D'Arcy and I may go back and re-visit this one a little later next week before it is sent to be published. For now, this is what I have for the dead line tomorrow. D'Arcy and I really loved it.
It must be a Frank Lloyd Wright home. Several things set the 1892 University established Robie House apart. The Japanese domestic inspired architecture made up of narrow stained glass windows, a center cluster of chimneys, canter leaver roof made entirely of one steel beam, oh—and all things horizontal: limestone, windows, doorways, and roof. This renowned architect, who believed that art should be integrated into the homes he built while still fitting into the landscape surrounding it, designed the prairie style mansion that has been standing in Hyde Park since 1910. Currently, the mansion rests as a major tourist attraction, a “must see” for those visiting Chicago’s Hyde Park. Inside, it has the feel of a fortress—low and dark. Mirror like openings, prow like furniture, walls free of artwork; Wright believed in the unity of design through built-ins and a distinctive structure considered to be art in itself.
What, exactly, attracts visitors to this national landmark? During a recent tour of the house, visitors seemed spellbound as a docent led them through the labyrinthine house.
“I just love architecture! Wright’s architecture in particular,” Ralph Szypcio, small Chicago business owner and first time tourist of the Robie home says. He took a day off work to introduce his young nephew to the delights of Wright’s architectural brilliance.
“We’re gifted with having five senses. We are always looking at topography—this is the obsession. It’s architecture, design.”
“I have mixed feelings about the home,” another tourist says.
“Because it reminds me of my own childhood home which was influenced by Wright’s architecture. Therefore, it stood out and that made it controversial.”
Controversy, death, and heart break would become the subtext for this Hyde Park masterpiece. Work of architectural genius aside, this declared landmark was only occupied a year and a half before the Robie family moved out due to a death that weakened the Robie’s financial stability. And a pattern commenced itself, forever haunting the landmark.
“The Robies moved out due to the death of Frederick Robie’s father. In order to pay the loans for his illness, they had to sell the home they spent years building,” Charlotte Schuerman, tour guide for the Robie House Tours, says.
“Two more families occupied the mansion after that. The second family moved in for only a year before death struck one of the children. The third family occupied the mansion for a longer period of time—fifteen years. They too, moved out when the husband died.”
Controversy ensued when a seminary bought the home and used it as a temporary dormitory for married couples with the hopes of demolishing Wright’s work to free space for a larger building. It was an action that infuriated the architect, whose famous words discouraged the almost-demolition “It just goes to show you can never trust the clergy with anything spiritual.”
Nonetheless, its historical importance was recognized and people fought to preserve it. Since then, the Robie House has undergone major exterior and interior restorations and stands as a national landmark, museum, and tourist hot spot. Does tour guide Schuerman ever reflect on the building’s storied past? She shrugs,
“I guess I don’t think one way or the other about it. It is one of those stories, you know? Heartbreak hotel.”
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