The Winslow House is a
Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright (June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright played a key role in the architectural movements o ...
-designed house located at 515 Auvergne Place in
River Forest,
Illinois
Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...
. A landmark building in Wright's career, the Winslow House, built in 1893–94, was his first major commission as an independent architect. While the design owes a debt to the earlier
James Charnley House
The James Charnley Residence, also known as the Charnley-Persky House, is a historic house museum at 1365 North Astor Street in the Gold Coast neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. Built in 1892, it is one of the few surviving residential works ...
, Wright always considered the Winslow House extremely important to his career. Looking back on it in 1936, he described it as "the first 'prairie house'."
The original owner, William Winslow, was exemplary of Wright's Chicago clients, which the architect described as, "American men of business with unspoiled instincts and ideals." A manufacturer of decorative ironwork, Winslow later worked with Wright on a number of publishing projects, specifically for
Keats's ''
The Eve of St. Agnes
''The Eve of St. Agnes'' is a Romantic narrative poem of 42 Spenserian stanzas set in the Middle Ages. It was written by John Keats in 1819 and published in 1820. The poem was considered by many of Keats's contemporaries and the succeeding ...
'' (1896), and William C. Gannett's ''The House Beautiful'' (1896–97). The men were first introduced through Winslow's dealings with Adler and Sullivan, Wright's former employers. He was in the ornamental iron business and his firm had done the facade on the Carson Pirie Scott building for Wright's previous employer. Adler and Sullivan were not interested in performing residential architectural assignments so Winslow turned to Wright. The house's design is inspired by the works of Wright's mentor
Louis Sullivan and anticipates Wright's mature
Prairie School
Prairie School is a late 19th- and early 20th-century architectural style, most common in the Midwestern United States. The style is usually marked by horizontal lines, flat or hipped roofs with broad overhanging eaves, windows grouped in ...
buildings of the next decade. Sheltered beneath a low-pitched roof with wide
eaves
The eaves are the edges of the roof which overhang the face of a wall and, normally, project beyond the side of a building. The eaves form an overhang to throw water clear of the walls and may be highly decorated as part of an architectural styl ...
, the home is symmetrical and horizontally divided into a stone section, a golden Roman brick section, and a
terra cotta
Terracotta, terra cotta, or terra-cotta (; ; ), in its material sense as an earthenware substrate, is a clay-based unglazed or glazed ceramic where the fired body is porous.
In applied art, craft, construction, and architecture, terracotta ...
frieze of Sullivanesque ornament. In contrast to the calm and balanced front facade, the rear is a mass of irregular geometric forms. The interior echoes both Wright's own home and the
Charnley House
The James Charnley Residence, also known as the Charnley-Persky House, is a historic house museum at 1365 North Astor Street in the Gold Coast neighborhood of Chicago, Illinois. Built in 1892, it is one of the few surviving residential works ...
, with the fireplace at the center facing the entry with rooms on either side and a hidden main staircase.
The house was added to the
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
on April 17, 1970.
In 2016 the house was sold for $1.375 million. It had been owned by the general manager of a local television station. His family had owned the house for 57 years.
References
* Storrer, William Allin. ''The Frank Lloyd Wright Companion''. University Of Chicago Press, 2006, (S.024)
External links
A site about Winslow HouseArchive of photographs and drawings
New York Times, June 8, 1986
Photos on Arcaid
{{Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright buildings
Houses completed in 1894
Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Cook County, Illinois
River Forest, Illinois