American House Styles by John Milnes Baker

Author:John Milnes Baker
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Countryman Press
Published: 2018-06-21T16:00:00+00:00

Frank Lloyd Wright’s own house, 1893

SHINGLE 1880–1905

PRAIRIE1900–1920

Less than a decade after he built his own Shingle style house in Oak Park, Frank Lloyd Wright developed a new and distinct regional style: the Prairie style. It featured open planning; shallow-pitched roofs with broad, sheltering overhangs; bands of casement windows, often with abstract patterns of stained glass; and a strong horizontal emphasis. The siding was usually stucco, either off-white or an earthy tone, with decorative banding that echoed the low horizon of the midwestern prairie. Porte cocheres and raised porches extending out from the main core of the house were typical features of the style.

Prairie houses grew in popularity during the first decade of the twentieth century and had many promoters. By 1910 there existed a definite vocabulary that defined a natural house that was sympathetic to the regional landscape. The school invented new decorative motifs and rejected all details that derived from European precedent.

Though popular in the Midwest, the Prairie style offended eastern establishment architects who were promoting the reminiscent styles, particularly the Colonial Revival. The 1918 jury for “A House for the Vacation Season,” competition patronizingly awarded fourth prize for the single Prairie style submission with the comment that “it did not deserve all the cheap jokes passed upon it by its detractors.” The jury also compared Prairie houses to railroad sleeping cars and warned that the occupants would have “no more privacy than a goldfish.”

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