Pow and Kapow
Chicago
The first time I went to this place — 1 year ago
Not worth it!
We took my parents there when they came to weekend. My father is a huge FLW fan, and I went with him to Taliesin West years ago and it was amazing.
The Robie House was not as exciting. It was extremely inventive and original, but the overall effect was sort of ostentatious and – sorry – ugly. Also really not practical. For example, it’s supposed to be in the “Prairie Style” which is supposed to blend in with the prairie environment. This is something he was really into, and he used the concept of buildings blending with their surroundings very well in Arizona. In this case, I don’t think it worked as well. For one thing, it wasn’t built on the prairie, but in the city of Chicago, in an already very developed neighborhood full of gothic-influenced college buildings. So it doesn’t fit at all. And here’s the impractical bit – it’s long and low and flat-roofed, because that’s how the prairie looked to him. But how silly is it to have flat roofs – tiers of them – in the Midwest, where it snows feet at a time?
There is one tiny corner of the house that has been restored to what it originally looked like. There is a nice warm yellow paint, really cool lights, and overall a really nice effect. Maybe when the whole house looked that way, it was lovely. But now it wasn’t. Although, if you’re interested in architecture, it was definitely very interesting.
