The state of Wright in Buffalo
By Barry A. Muskat
Frank Lloyd Wright, America’s most celebrated and influential architect, created a legacy of work in a career that spanned more than seven decades. His built work in Buffalo is evolving into the centerpiece that will put Western New York on the map as one of America’s top architectural tourism destinations.
A building-by-building survey of Wright structures in Buffalo:
 |
|
The restored Martin House veranda.
Photo courtesy of the Darwin Martin House Restoration Corporation. |
The brightest star in the Buffalo constellation of Wright works is the Darwin D. Martin House, built at the corner of Jewett Parkway and Summit Avenue (1903-1905.) It was commissioned by Martin, an executive of the Larkin Soap Company. This 1.7-acre estate is composed of six integrated buildings. Wright designed it in its entirety—not only the buildings, but the furniture, art glass, and landscape. He would later refer to it as his opus, “a nigh perfect composition.”
Now listed as a National Historic Landmark, the highest level of distinction on the National Register, it can be seen as one of the treasures of Wright’s Prairie period and recognized as one of the jewels of his entire career. Buffalo is home to what is clearly one of the most important Wright sites in the country.
For some years, the Martin House has been undergoing the most ambitious restoration ever undertaken on any Frank Lloyd Wright site. What began as a project by a small group of concerned citizens to save just one historic house has evolved into a mission to restore the entire complex to its glory as it stood in 1907.
Not since the original structures were built has there been more excitement, more optimism, and more proof of progress evidenced in brick and mortar. Major phases of the restoration are completed. New roofs and gutters are in place. Mechanical systems, basement waterproofing, relocation of utilities, and drilling of the new geo-thermal wells are less visible but equally important.
 |
|
Vintage views of the Martin House that
show the original structures. Photo courtesy of the Darwin Martin House Restoration Corporation. |
Work is ongoing, with the next goal being repairing of all the exterior masonry and architectural concrete on the historic building. Restoration will continue in phases, to the interior plasters and wood, right on through to furniture and art glass. This textbook restoration of the historic structures and rebuilding of demolished elements is not only exciting for Buffalo, but is of keen interest to architectural historians, restoration architects, and scholars internationally.
The Barton House
This was Wright’s first Buffalo commission and the first house on the property (1903), built for Martin’s sister, Delta, and her husband George Barton. It became the test for whether Martin (the consummate businessman) and Wright (the architect from Chicago) could work together: a test that evolved into a friendship that would last until Martin’s death in 1935. The Barton house is a wonderful example of Wright’s early Prairie houses with wide overhanging eaves, gently-sloped hip roofs, and banded windows. Its simple cruciform plan shows glimpses of ideas in process for the main house, a house that would more resemble a Chicago skyscraper in its structural elements.
 |
|
Barton House, the restored pergola.
Photo courtesy of the Darwin Martin House Restoration Corporation. |
The pergola
The reconstruction of the pergola is probably the most exciting and dramatic change to the site. Demolished in the early 1960s, this was an elegant covered passageway connecting the main house to a glass-roofed conservatory.
Only its stub remained attached to the house.
To many, the pergola’s reconstruction is the most symbolic element of the project. It’s been built to original dimensions on its original site (using Wright’s plans and evidence provided by sections of foundation remnants). From the Martin House interior, it recreates the dramatic view that greeted the visitor from the front entry hall, through the axis of the pergola on to the lush greenery of the conservatory, a distance spanning 180 feet.
Now that much of the construction debris has been cleared, the stately scale of the original estate is evident. For the MHRC staff, board, and corps of volunteers, the rebuilt pergola seems most emblematic of the entire project’s hopes and goals—a pinnacle has been reached and the balance will follow.
The conservatory
The conservatory might prove to be the most fascinating building of the estate, given its complex footprint and large number of outside corners. The composition is woven with delicate lines and open vertical spaces. When its windows are installed, the designs will be tall and linear, with large expanses of clear glass and sparing use of jewel-like color.
The structure is now ready to accept its glass roof, and Wright’s original integral gutter system for the building has been recreated and is ready to be installed. The re-created conservatory will be topped by four finials in the form of large Wright-designed birdhouses. Two of the original limestone birdhouses are intact and two have been replicated to their exact design.
One of the greatest challenges of the entire restoration/reconstruction project was obtaining the golden yellow Roman brick to repair the original houses and reconstruct the missing elements. A source for the 100,000 required bricks was found after a nine-year search.
The carriage house
The reconstructed carriage house/garage, originally built strictly as a service building, is massively constructed of red utility brick—now being covered in a skin of golden Roman brick. When the original and replicated windows are installed, their simple rectilinear lines and squares of opalescent blue will be unexpected show-stoppers for future visitors.
 |
|
A view of the gardener's cottage.
Photo courtesy of the Darwin Martin House Restoration Corporation. |
Recent acquisition of the gardener’s cottage was the final piece of the puzzle needed to make the estate whole. The sixth building on the estate (it actually faces Woodward Avenue), it was designed by Wright, though not built by the Martins until 1909.
In itself, it’s a fine example of a Prairie House on an extremely small scale and modest budget. Instead of brick, its wall surface is stucco. Its previous owner, Gregory Kinsmen (a Buffalo native who now lives in Massachusetts), had lovingly restored its cozy interiors and installed a sympathetic family room addition.
In the context of the entire estate, it’s an intimate house whose lines, windows, and art glass interweave with the signature details of the other elements of the Martin House.
The visitor’s center
Architect Toshiko Mori was awarded the commission to design the new visitor’s center following a national design competition. (Spree, 11/03)
Her design for a garden pavilion will be located roughly where the most-recently-demolished apartment building stood. Its predominant material is glass, a material which Mori says “dematerializes the mass of the building as its transparency allows an immediate connection with the landscape.” The design is in the final stages of construction drawings with a start date yet to be announced.
The Martin House Complex is open for regular and specialty tours. Call 856-3858 or check www.darwinmartinhouse.org.
Graycliff
Wright designed a summer home for the Martin family on the rocky shores of Lake Erie (1926-27). It sits on a seventy-foot cliff overlooking the lake. In timeframe, the house is closer to Fallingwater, Wright’s most famous residential design (Bear Run, Pennsylvania, 1936). In style and ideas, it could be considered somewhat transitional. For Graycliff, Isabelle Martin was the client. She commissioned a house that was more light-filled, appropriate to summer sunshine and lake breezes.
Mrs. Martin had been forced to abandon her city house in 1937, and by 1943, financial pressures forced her to abandon Graycliff as well. The property was bought in 1951 by an Order of Piarist Fathers who made substantial invasive changes to Wright’s design.
The house was rescued by a grassroots organization (now the extremely energetic and enthusiastic Graycliff Conservancy). Results from their ongoing restoration efforts (to restore the house to its appearance in 1930) are readily apparent. The site was designated a New York State Landmark in 1998.
A press conference was held in June to officially announce the beginning of Phase Three of the restoration project. To date, garden walls have been stabilized and the “heat house” rebuilt. (The small heat house was restored as a prototype for the entire project.) The Piarist gymnasium has been converted to a visitor’s pavilion. Other non-Wright buildings have been removed. Roofs have been repaired, the chimney has been re-laid, and the garage and servant apartment have been restored.
Phase Three will include the interior and exterior of the Foster House and major repairs to the exterior of the Main house and to balconies of both buildings. Part A of this phase should be completed by the end of the year. Part B is subject to finances. Executive Director Reine Hauser explains, “As a grassroots organization, we’re very fiscally conservative, so we do not start a phase before we have raised the money to pay for it.”
Graycliff is open to visitors with a regular schedule of tours. Call 947-9217 or check the website: www.graycliff.bfn.org.
The Heath House and the Davidson House
These two Wright-designed Buffalo homes are in private hands and are not open to the public. The occupants respectfully request that their privacy be respected.
The William Heath House (on Soldier’s Place at Bird) was designed for the office manager for the Larkin Soap Company, William Heath.
The house is on a narrow city lot positioned close to the sidewalk. Wright raised its living areas from street level and employed other devices to screen the views of passersby and assure privacy to the family, a configuration that he would perfect before designing the Robie House (Chicago, 1909), the most famous house from his Prairie Period.
The Soldier’s Place house was heavily remodeled in the 1940s. Originally, the garage/stable was a separate building, but it was joined with the main house when doctor’s offices were added. Those expecting the dark natural oak of the Martin House will be surprised to see that all the woods of the Heath House are pickled and lightened, which was probably done at the time of the renovation of the forties. Wood floors have been restored to their original colors, though baseboards and trims remain bleached. The wall sconces (said to be designed by Walter Burley Griffin) are the same fixtures as found in the Barton House.
Windows were made by the Linden Glass Company (who did the windows for the Martin House). The house was originally furnished with Wright-designed furniture; the original dining room tables and chairs are now owned by the Martin House.
The current owners have been occupying the house since the late 1960s. They’ve been excellent stewards of the property. The Heath House is not landmarked, but it is hoped a “Friends of the Heath House” group will be formed to help restore its windows and keep the house preserved and intact.
The Walter Davidson House (1908) is on Tillinghast Place and is a much more modest residence in size and plan. It incorporates gentle pitched roofs and banded windows. Instead of the brick used on the Martin and Heath houses, its exterior is made of stucco.
The house has diamond-shaped clear leaded glass windows with none of the patterning or autumnal colors of windows in Wright’s typical Prairie House. The house is best known for the cathedral-like ceiling in its living room. Coupled with the large bay of tall casement windows (which face the side yard instead of the street), these features give the small house a spacious feeling.
The Davidson House recently changed ownership, although an agreement allows the previous long-term homeowners to stay in place.
 |
|
The Blue Sky Mausoleum.
Photo courtesy of Forest Lawn. |
Darwin Martin asked Frank Lloyd Wright to design a mausoleum for his family in Buffalo’s Forest Lawn Cemetery and commissioned the design between 1925 and 1928. However, due to the Great Depression and other events responsible for Martin’s loss of wealth, the structure was never built during his lifetime.
Using Wright’s designs, notes, and the correspondence between the two men, Forest Lawn Cemetery has constructed the memorial. The Blue Sky Mausoleum—made of white granite and poured concrete—was unveiled in October 2004.
This project is one of only three memorials designed by Wright and is considered to be his most innovative. Sited on a knoll between two spring-fed ponds, the memorial abandons the traditional walls and roof to terrace down a hill and “break the box” of conventional mausoleum design. Standing at its base, the viewer can observe the single row of stairs that separates the terraced crypts, stairs which subtly widen as they climb the gentle ascent to a small plaza. At its peak is a single monolith, positioned on an axis and perpendicular to the crypt. Granite benches cantilever from each side of the monolith’s base. Its rectangular block is decorated with a patterning of Wrightian squares in a simple design without beginning or end.
Wright’s note to Martin explained, “This is burial facing the open sky—a dignified great headstone commune to all.”
 |
The next of Wright’s unexecuted designs destined to be built in Buffalo is a boathouse originally proposed for the University of Wisconsin Boat Club (Spree, 4/06). The new building will be situated along the Niagara River’s Black Rock Channel, near the existing West Side Rowing Club, itself a venerable institution of rowing history and the largest rowing club in America. The new structure will be put into operation for its original intended use as a true working boathouse. The nonprofit Frank Lloyd Wright’s Rowing Boathouse Corporation emphasizes that interpretation on site will clearly reveal to visitors the distinction between when the boathouse was designed and built.
This small boathouse will be a more significant building when completed than many people have realized. It will be highly visible and appealing, sited near the point where Lake Erie converges with the Niagara River. Visitors crossing the Peace Bridge from Canada to the United States will be treated to a premium bird’s-eye view, and vehicular traffic on the Niagara Extension of the Thruway will see it along the shore that forms our nation’s border.
At the time of this writing, the boathouse was on target for an early summer groundbreaking. Construction is anticipated to take fourteen to sixteen months. Executive Director Sharon Courtin predicts, “We’ll definitely be ready for regatta season 2007!”
The Buffalo Filling Station
Yet a third unexecuted design by Wright is also scheduled for construction. Designed for the Harris Oil Company (the local distributor for Tydol Gasoline), the commission for the filling station was secured through Darwin Martin and William Heath.
The 1927 design reflects Wright’s early awareness of how very significant the automobile would be to America, and illustrates his effort to create an appropriate form for a gas station. The gas station project predated Wright’s utopian vision for an urban metropolis, Broadacre City (1935), an ideal urban community with plans for one-car houses up through five-car houses. The Buffalo Filling Station, designed for the corner of Michigan Avenue and Cherry Street in Buffalo, would have fit right into his broader scheme for the city.
The newly built station will be part of a larger complex, guided by the energies of James Sandoro. founder of the present Buffalo Transportation / Pierce Arrow Museum. The museum will form the backdrop for the filling station in this $10 million project.
Plans for the entire project have been drawn by architect Patrick Mahoney of Lauer-Manguso. “Wright’s drawings from the era are not as detailed as what we make today,” says Mahoney, who calls his work an “interpretation” of Wright’s drawings. “Your biggest fear is that you don’t pull it off. We’ve developed it along with the museum to replicate as much of the design as possible.” Mahoney also works with the Wright-designed Graycliff Conservancy.
Wright’s station didn’t use conventional underground gasoline tanks. Instead, gas was to be dispensed through overhead fuel lines, suspended from a cantilevered canopy. Wright also designed two copper “totems” to be used at each station. The spires would carry signage and were scheduled to be forty-five feet tall. A prototype of the design is being manufactured and the poles will be installed in the size Wright specified. Sandoro predicts that they’ll “be seen for miles.”
Barry A. Muskat is the architecture critic for Buffalo Spree.
SUBSCRIBE NOW
Back to the Table of Contents
Back to Top