Darwin D. Martin House on Bloomberg

An image of the Darwin D. Martin House in the early 20th century from the University at Buffalo's Darwin D. Martin collection. 

Bloomberg's architecture critic James S. Russell has a nice piece about the Darwin D. Martin House Complex restoration on the Bloomberg Web site [via MAN]. An excerpt:

The coiled energy of Frank Lloyd Wright's shifting, crisscrossing piers and roofs can't be confined by mere property lines. This house looks ready to sail into the endless space of the continent across waves of tall grass.

...

Massive brick piers form recesses at the corners so the long, low hip roofs appear to float. Wright extends more interlocking piers, like great haunches, into the landscape. The house exerts a raw power that's unusual because he didn't use the decorative finials or lacy, embossed panels found in his other houses of the time.

The interior is still being restored, though Wright's characteristic expansiveness is clear in the primary living spaces that flow liquidly together and open up views in three directions. Wright's justly famous art-glass windows elegantly filter daylight.

Breaking down the rigid hierarchies of Victorian space resonated with Martin, who hoped this house would encourage the rich family life that was lacking in his own childhood. The house has an unusually direct, masculine style in its cream-colored walls and gold-flecked ceilings.

--Colin Dabkowski