sunflower house

A mid-century round house in Madison, Wisconsin, has just hit the market –

Built in 1952-53 by architect James Dresser, who studied with Frank Lloyd Wright at Taliesin, the house has a central skylight, curved hallways, cork walls, a mix of wood and cork floors, and a round brick fireplace. It was for some years the architect’s family home.

Structurally, the house is a concrete shell built on a radial framework of curved steel beams. Stylistically, it’s both circular and angular, its round form accented by a series of triangular windows.

The innovative house was featured in a November 1952 edition of Popular Mechanics, which said, in something of rhetorical flourish, that “cobwebs will never collect in the corners” of the new house because “there aren’t any corners.”

round masterpiece for sale

Before the spiraling Guggenheim Museum in NYC, there was this spiraling house in Phoenix –

Iconic American architect Frank Lloyd Wright designed the house in 1952 for his son David, who lived in the house with his wife Gladys until their deaths (at ages 102 and 104, respectively). After it was sold out of the family in 2009, it faced possible demolition at the hands of a rapacious developer, but was saved by lawyer/builder Zach Rawling.

Advised by Wright historians and preservation architects, as well as by his architecture-loving mother, Rawling spent several years restoring the house and grounds. He tried to turn the house into a museum, but neighbors opposed the plan, fearing that the residential area would be harmed by excessive traffic.

Rawling explained the house’s greatness –

“Great buildings impact every sense and create an emotional reaction,” said Rawling. “Wright’s original plans for the David Wright House are labeled ‘How to Live in the Southwest.’ After two years of being on the property, I appreciate living in the desert more than I ever have growing up. The care with which he sited the house to relate to the surrounding environment is incredible. Wright was a genius at thinking spatially. There is a continuous dance of light and shadows on the house. It’s a natural extension of the environment.”

Besides its architectural cachet, the house features hand-cut Philippines mahogany, custom-designed furnishings, one of Wright’s signature “March Balloons” carpets, a shaded central courtyard, and a 360-square-foot guest house.

For somewhere south of $13 million, it could be yours.

jacksonville geodesica

A showy mid-century round house in Jacksonville, Florida, was just put on the market –

the future is not yet here

The vacation house of the future, as conceived in 1957 by automobile designer James R. Powers –

It has stylistic affinities with the Theme Building at Los Angeles International Airport, built during the same period –

happy birthday frank lloyd wright & bruce goff!

Two of the most creative architects ever to embrace the round form, Frank Lloyd Wright and Bruce Goff, were both born on June 8—Wright in 1867, and Goff in 1904.

For Wright, the circular form symbolized freedom, an escape from the traditional residential box. As he explained in 1952, “a box is a containment. I tried to abolish the box.” Wright designed at least 14 round and semi-circular houses, as well as, most famously, the spiraling Guggenheim Museum in NYC. Not all of his round house designs were built; sadly, some of his most beautiful and innovative efforts never made it beyond the planning stage.

Wright’s 1938 project for Ralph Jester, meant for a suburban housing community in Palos Verdes, California, was his first attempt at a circular residence –

Another unbuilt round house was the Ludd M. Spivey house, which Wright designed during the same period.

les maisons ballons

A colony of Wallace Neff’s bubble houses (“maisons ballons”) in Dakar — as they look now –

And as they looked in 1949, when they were built –

360 degrees of architecture

Cecil Alexander’s circular house in Atlanta, on the cover of Florida Architect in April 1958. Finished in 1957, the house was featured in Life magazine in November of that year, and in Progressive Architecture in November 1959.

would you live in a circular house?

Back in the late 1950s, when living in the suburbs was understood to be the common aspiration of mankind, the magazine Suburbia Today asked this question of its readers. In an article about the “unusual suburban home” of Mr. and Mrs. Walter Benson, whose circular floor plan offered ample open space for entertaining guests, it gave an appealing glimpse of life in the round.

Stunning views, tasteful furnishings, elegant cocktail parties — a round home was modern and glamorous, the magazine suggested.

The Walter Bensons wanted their house to be round so that they could get maximum exposure to their magnificent views. To live way, way up on the top of a mountain in a house that seems to melt in with its surroundings; to look freely all about you and see the mountain ridges to the side, the bay and ocean below, and the teeming city across that you must be part of and yet can turn away from at will — this was the dream of the Bensons.

los feliz lautner

The Harvey Residence, in LA’s Los Feliz neighborhood, designed by John Lautner in characteristically exuberant style –

Built in 1950, the house was in terrible shape in 1998 when it was bought and restored by actress Kelly Lynch and writer Mitch Glazer. Lautner principal Helena Arahuete led the restoration, and the original builder, John de la Veaux, came back to assist on it.

The swirling living room is stunning.