Day 17 - Connellsville, PA to Huntington, WV

Sunday, May 17, 2015
Huntington, West Virginia, United States
This morning we went to Mill Run, PA to see Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater house. 
 
 
 




 

Oh my! Definitely click on the photo above to see it bigger. This was the "summer cottage" of the Edgar Kaufmann family of Pittsburgh. The Kaufmanns owned the property and had a retreat here, but decided they wanted a bigger place. They met Wright because their son studied with him for awhile at Taliesin in Spring Green, Wisconsin. They envisioned a cottage on the shore with a picture window looking onto the waterfall. Frank said that was boring, and that soon they would forget the waterfall was there and not even look out the window, so he designed the house to be part of the waterfall.  
 
   
 



















 























 




 

The natural rock of the site comes into some of the rooms, the stone and glass is meant to blend with nature and there is water everywhere, not just the waterfall, but some of the stone walls leak and drip - Wright said water always wins, so you just deal with it. The Kaufmann's budget for the "cottage" was about $30,000, it ended up costing $155,000 which is $2.6 million in today's dollars, but it would probably cost way more than that to build today - it was built during the depression when people would work for peanuts just to have a job.
 
 
 
 




















 There are only two paint colors - his signature Cherokee red for all the metal surfaces and an ochre color that blends with the landscape for the concrete surfaces. The house is about 2800 square feet inside, with almost the same amount - 2500 square feet - of terraces outside. Each bedroom and the great room have terraces attached because the house was to encourage one to be outside. There is a guest annex that has a living room that can sleep two, a bedroom, a bath and another terrace. There's also a swimming pool there. The family wanted a pool but Wright thought it would detract from the natural waterfall so he put it up where no one can see it unless you're in the annex. This building also contained a 4 car carport to hide the cars away - they also detracted from the natural beauty - and staff quarters. A gardener and groundskeeper lived there permanently and they brought 4 staff with them when they came from Pittsburgh. 
 


 
Most of the furniture was designed by Wright as well and is cantilevered, just like all the balconies are. This is the only Wright house open to the public that has all the furnishings and artwork intact. Mr. Kaufmann wanted a desk in his room so Wright made a small desk. Mr. Kaufmann said he needed a bigger desk. Wright said no. Mr. Kaufmann said he needed a big desk in order to write a big check. So Wright designed this desk with a cut-out so the window could still open.
 
If I had to choose between a Newport "summer cottage" and this "cottage", this one would win, hands down. The interior photos were stolen off the internet because no photos are allowed inside. And they don't sell postcards in the museum shop, just expensive coffee table books. You can learn a whole bunch more at www.fallingwater.org.
 
Now a couple of stories about Frank Lloyd Wright. He grew up in the Spring Green, Wisconsin area and returned there to build his home and school at Taliesin. He was a brilliant architect and artist, but not always a very nice person. He was notorious for not paying his bills, not because he didn't have the money, he just didn't think it was important. My step uncle owned a paint company in Madison, WI and Wright hired him to paint at Taliesin. Uncle Bernie never got paid, but several years later Wright had the nerve to call Uncle Bernie to paint again. When my mom was in college she worked in a nice clothing store on the edge of campus. One day Wright's daughter came in and picked out a scarf and asked my mom to charge it to her father's account. My mom's boss told her no, they couldn't do that, so the daughter left. Pretty soon Frank strode in wearing his famous cape, threw the scarf in my mom's face and said "I'll pay cash for this."
 





 








After leaving there, we drove through some pretty impressive mountains into West Virginia. This is my first time in WV (except for Harpers Ferry a couple weeks ago) - what a beautiful state!  
 
 






















 

We drove most of the afternoon through the mountains. We got rained on a couple of times - not bad - until we got to Charleston where we had to switch highways. Just as we entered town the sky opened up and it poured. We could barely see the road but there was no place to pull over. Fortunately everyone else was barely moving too, so we managed to get through and on to the right highway.
 









 

 
Tonight we are in Huntington, WV on the Ohio River right across the border from Kentucky. We're about 8 hours from home, and decided we are sick of traveling, so tomorrow will be our longest day, a mad dash for home. So this will probably be the last blog entry, unless we see or do something tomorrow worth writing about. We hope you've enjoyed reading about our adventure. Stay tuned for the next one.
 





 
Crazy Travelers  
Other Entries

Comments

Janean
2015-05-18

I've enjoyed reading your blog! Safe trip home!!

wess
2015-05-18

this is on my bucket list!

Damarys Velarde
2015-05-18

WOW!!!!! I have always wanted to see that house up close and personal. ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS!!!!!

Margarita
2015-05-18

Muy lindas aventuras. Disfruté leyendo todos los lugares que visitaron :)

Etta
2015-05-19

It's been fun riding along with you. You saw so many places that we missed on our trip to New England and now I want to go back!

2025-02-15

Comment code: Ask author if the code is blank