18th century windmill

The Round Tower, a listed building in Cirencester, Gloucestershire, England -

The tower is believed to date back to 1790.  The first record of its existence is in a 1791 lease, which says it was erected by Earl Bathurst, being part of a large estate that included Cirencester House, the Bathurst family’s ancestral seat. Then classified as a wind grist mill, the building was leased for a yearly sum of 38 pounds, 6 shillings, and 6 pence.

Because it was located quite close to the Thames & Severn Canal, whose five round houses were built during the same time period, some have posited a link between the windmill’s construction and the canal buildings: either that it was built by the same team of contractors, or that it was a copy, or that the canal’s round houses were copies.

According to the UK’s 1871 and 1881 census, a shepherd named Nevil Witts inhabited the structure, which was still deemed a windmill even though it no longer functioned as one.

the casa bola

This month’s edition of Apartamento magazine features an interview with Brazilian architect Eduardo Longo, who designed — and has lived for decades in — a spherical house in São Paulo.

Built by Longo himself over a five-year period, beginning in the early 1970s, the house was meant to be the prototype for a utopian project of apartment blocks made of up dozens of spherical structures.  The apartment blocks were never built, but Longo has now lived more than 30 years in his “ball house,” or Casa Bola.

Made of smooth molded concrete, the house is 25 feet in diameter, and has four levels, three bedrooms, several bathrooms, a dining room, a living room, a kitchen, and a hammock. Its decor is strictly minimalist and very white. Much more colorful on the outside, it sports a bright yellow slide that exits from below and a spherical yellow decoration on top.

Longo’s son Lucas, who grew up in the Casa Bola, now has a spherical house of his own. Both structures have been featured on the TV series The World’s Most Extreme Homes. The son’s house, whose levels are linked by curving ramps rather than stairs, is somewhat reminiscent of Eduardo Longo’s 1980 design for a utopian pavilion.

sold!

A round house in Phoenix, Arizona, built by legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright, sold for $2.38 million in late December 2012, saving it from demolition.  One of the architect’s later works, the historic 1952 structure prefigures the circular design of the Guggenheim Museum.

The house was almost lost. A development company, 8081 Meridien, bought the property for $1.8 million in June 2012, planning to subdivide the land, demolish the house, and replace it with two luxury homes. Interviewed by the New York Times a few months later, one of the firm’s two principals admitted that he had no idea of the structure’s significance, or even of the difference “between Frank Lloyd Wright and the Wright brothers.”

organic architecture in ohio

The Orcutt House, on sale in Worthington, Ohio, consists of two intersecting circles, one forming the body of the house and the other forming a smaller kitchen area.  Designed by architect Theodore van Fossen in 1958, it is a single story structure on a 0.7 acre lot.

The house is part of a residential community called Rush Creek Village, inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright’s principles of organic architecture. Made up of 49 single-family houses linked by a system of curvilinear streets, the neighborhood and each of its homes were designed by van Fossen, who had worked for Wright on construction projects in the late 1930s in Indiana.

an affinity for curves

With the death of Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer on December 5, the world has lost one of the leading proponents of curved, rounded, wavy and spiraling forms. A modernist innovator, Niemeyer, who began working in the late 1930s, eschewed the straight lines and boxy shapes that had characterized modernism up to that time.

“Right angles don’t attract me. Nor straight, hard and inflexible lines created by man,” explained Niemeyer in The Curves of Time, his 1998 memoir. “What attracts me are free and sensual curves. The curves we find in mountains, in the waves of the sea, in the body of the woman we love.”

round house for sale

$899,000 will buy you a 110-year-old round house in the Brookland neighborhood of Washington, DC. It is a quirky and charming structure even though, as part of an unfortunate recent renovation, it was stripped of its spiral staircase and marred by a clunky addition.

Built in 1901, the house was put on the market in 2010 when its long-term owner died.  Its condition at that time was said to be poor; it was also tiny by 21st century standards. After changing hands a couple of times, the house was bought by developer Martin Ditto of Ditto Residential, who undertook the recent renovations.  Last January, the house was said to be under consideration for protection as a historic landmark, but the D.C. Preservation League, which was submitting the landmark application, negotiated with the developer regarding the scope of the planned renovations, agreeing not submit an application until renovations were complete. The League apparently pressed the developer to limit the size of the addition so that it would not dwarf the existing structure.

The house’s original architect was Edward Woltz; the 2012 renovations were designed by architect Chuong Cao of DEP Designs. Here’s a pre-renovation photo -

reprieve for frank lloyd wright round house

A deal was signed last week by the developer who owns the 1952 Frank Lloyd Wright-designed house in Phoenix, and the city of Phoenix, which delays the demolition of the house for at least a month.

The developer, 8081 Meridian, contends that the city issued a valid demolition permit that would allow the house to be torn down.  Having bought the house in June 2012 for $1.8 million, he has reportedly turned down a cash offer of more than $2 million from a prospective buyer looking to save the historic structure.

“It is probably the most important residential design of the last decade of his career,” said Janet Halstead, the  executive director of the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy. “Many architecture experts consider it among the 20 most important Frank Lloyd Wright designs ever built.”

The search for a buyer who can satisfy the developer’s financial demands continues.