Isham Railey McConnell (born 1916,

Versailles, Kentucky Versailles () is a home rule-class city in Woodford County, Kentucky, United States. It lies by road west of Lexington and is part of the Lexington-Fayette Metropolitan Statistical Area. Versailles has a population of 9,316 according to 2017 cen ...

; died October 26, 2002, Bedford, Massachusetts, aged 86) was an architect who studied for a year under Frank Lloyd Wright and later at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (class of 1953).

Early life and education

McConnell was born to John M. McConnell and Louise Sharon Railey in Versailles, Kentucky, where his family owned a large farm. He attended but dropped out of University of Kentucky and instead became a student of Frank Lloyd Wright in 1939, first at Taliesin in Spring Green, Wisconsin and later the same year at Taliesin West, Scottsdale, Arizona. He served in the Pacific during World War II as an Army engineer, enlisting in 1942. He began an architecture degree at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1949. He met Judith Lindau in the class and they later married, a marriage that was to last until his death in 2002. They both graduated with the class of 1953. They later had a son, Laurance, and a daughter, Julia.

Career

McConnell mainly designed contemporary homes, most of them in the Massachusetts towns of Bedford, Lexington, Concord, and

Sudbury Sudbury may refer to: Places Australia * Sudbury Reef, Queensland Canada * Greater Sudbury, Ontario (official name; the city continues to be known simply as Sudbury for most purposes) ** Sudbury (electoral district), one of the city's federal e ...

. A fit to the natural landscape, using only natural materials, with a strong emphasis on lighting were signature elements. He designed an octagonal writing studio attached to the Bethany, Connecticut home of Judith's brother-in-law, Professor

R. W. B. Lewis Richard Warrington Baldwin Lewis (November 1, 1917 - June 13, 2002) was an American literary scholar and critic. He gained a wider reputation when he won a 1976 Pulitzer Prize for Biography or Autobiography, the first National Book Critics Circle ...

of Yale University. In the studio, Lewis wrote a biography of

Edith Wharton Edith Wharton (; born Edith Newbold Jones; January 24, 1862 – August 11, 1937) was an American novelist, short story writer, and interior designer. Wharton drew upon her insider's knowledge of the upper-class New York "aristocracy" to portray ...

for which he won the

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made h ...

. He held an architectural license until 1988. He died October 26, 2002, at his Bedford, Massachusetts home, aged 86.

Gallery

Isham Railey McConnell house in Sudbury MA

References

1916 births 2002 deaths 20th-century American architects People from Versailles, Kentucky Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni University of Kentucky alumni American military personnel of World War II {{US-architect-stub