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Quadruple Block Plan - 1900, by Frank Lloyd Wright …
… depicting 400 x 400 feet
[14864 m2 or approx. 3,7 acres] with each 'Prairie House' centered in its 200 x 200 feet [3716 m2] lot. XII.) 21
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Prairie House - 1900, by Frank Lloyd Wright
Label: "TAFEL XIII PRAIRIE-HAUS FÜR DIE PRAIRIE-GEMEINSCHAFT."
published in "The Ladies' Home Journal" […] February 1901 labelled: "A Home in a Prairie Town" [projected costs: $7000] I.) 1 XII.) 20
and similar in Alfred B. Yeomans' account of the Chicago City Club Housing Competition, 1916 [page 101] II.) Img. _02_a
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Quadruple Block Plan - 1903 (Project for Charles E. Roberts 1900 - 1903) by Frank Lloyd Wright …
… with individual lots reduced to approximately a sixth of an acre [675 m2]. XII.) 21 For a historic juxtaposition of the Roberts' project to Chicago see FLW0309.006 ? [ Also compare to A. R. Sennett 1905 ]
Images:
Robert C. Twombly [page 224] I.) 11
www.flickr.com
http://www.mongelli2000.com
http://cybergeo.revues.org/ […]
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Residential area development project in the context of the Chicago City Club Housing Competition for subdividing a typical (Model) Quarter-Section of Land [32 blocks = 160 acres = 64,75 ha] in the outskirts of Chicago. It was produced for the City Club on request from the club's civic secretary George E. Hooker IV.) 3 III.) 4 [as expressly not part of the competition XII.) 23 ], and is therefore labelled "non-competitive II.)". 1912-13 III.) 4 X.) 17
Images:
www.flickr.com
Robert C. Twombly I.) 8
Rodolphe El-Khoury and Edward Robbins IV.)
Robert C. Twombly identifies spatial segregation in Wright's Chicago City Club project: "[…] In general, homes for the comfortable and affluent dominated the choice sites near parks and social and cultural services, while within a kind of grudging necessity the workers were farmed out to periphery by themselves. […]" [page 225] I.) 8
KEY TO PLAN (sustaining that assessment in part) I.) 8
"[…]
S. Two and three room apartments for
men.
T. Two and three room apartments for
women.
V. Seven and eight room houses, better
class.
[…]"
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Explanation for Img. _05 Scheme C.
"[…] Each of the four houses moved to exterior angles of
the four lots of the sub-block — grouping uniformly in fours
equally distant from each other both ways, garages at center.
Each group connected by low walls about eight feet [2,44 m] back
from public walks. Major area of each lot suited for private
use as a garden.
Schemes [A, B, C] might be rhythmically interchanged in some wellbalanced
arrangements." II.) 6 X.) 19
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Anthony Alofsin also features the residential area development project in his account on Broadacre City in 1989 stating:
"It was in his non-competitive design for the development of a quarter section of land in Chicago that Wright began to make his architectural intentions explicit by providing a description of his programmatic purpose. Ironically, in certain key ways this scheme was the inversion of Broadacre City. […] Despite this attachment to the city, the quarter section scheme contained some basic ideas of Broadacre City in embryonic form. […]" XIV.) 25
Virginia L. Russell expresses [implicitly] the view that the project for Chicago City Club Housing Competition in fact sparked [and evolved into] Broadacre City. XIII.) 24
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Both interpretations [see also Neil Levine: III.) 4] offer two possible advisements:
a) Empathicly we assume:
Aware of the design's "inadequacies" in terms of lacking a clear vision [apart applied pragmatism with a branding design twist], Wright, [being the perfectionist perceived and therefore] eager to eradicate that flaw, refined his initially vague ideas until he shaped an urban vision that ultimately would become [worthy of] HIS.
A view projected with hindsight. Profoundly visionary urban conceptions weren't an issue [yet]. The city club project was a deliberate statement directed at [even tailored for see: KEY TO PLAN] a sophisticated audience engaged in a very particular socio-urban conduct. VII.) VIII.) Wright intended to impress The City Club [on their terms], and he certainly did.
and b) target-group-specific tunnel vision:
When reasoning the matter, we [including myself] simply overexpose this urban scheme as a [chronological] prototype for Broadacre City.
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![Chicago block compared to Frank Lloyd Wright's Quadruple Block [Sdoutz 2008]](content/chicago_usual_block_diagram_2008.gif "Chicago block compared to Frank Lloyd Wright's Quadruple Block [Sdoutz 2008]") |
II.) Img. _07
Label: "STANDARD CITY BLOCK As Used For Computations"
from 'City Residential Land Development: Studies in Planning: Competitive Plans for Subdividing a Typical Quarter Section of Land in the Outskirts of Chicago', edited by Alfred B. Yeomans, published by The University of Chicago Press, 1916 [page 138]
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Chicago block diagram, Sdoutz 2008
In view of that "picturesque variety" II.) 5 Wright intended, houses and lots [following the Chicago City Club project] turn out to be very X.) 19 small, at least compared to today's aspirations. The Quadruple Block Plan [based on the reproduction used in Img. _02] also suggests that quadruple block lots were NOT quite square, depending on their "side-alley" XII.) 22 widths.
Quadruple Lots in this diagram (Img. _06) are scaled to a block width of 270 feet [82,3 m], which is not "what became, during the real estate boom from 1866 to 1873, the standard (or usual) Chicago block of 266 by 600 feet." IV.) 9 as specified by Homer Hoyt in 1933 V.) 16,
but complies with Yeomans' account of the Chicago City Club Competition program from 1913. II.) Img. _07
"Standard City Block; as used for computations" (Img. _07)
block size (270 x 600 feet) [82,3 x 182,9 m]
street width (60 feet) [18,3 m]
no back alley
accommodating 48 lots (25 x 135 feet)
[7,6 x 41,1 m]
Compare block and lot dimensions [to the left of Img. _06] to:
Innovative Urban Wet-weather Flow Management Systems
by Richard Field, James P. Heaney and Robert Pitt, CRC Press, 2000 [page 38]
http://books.google.at/ PDF …
"Figure 2-9. Typical unit residential area, Chicago, IL (APWA, 1968)."
block size (264x594 feet) [80,5 x 181 m]
street width (66 feet) [20,1 m]
back alley (16 feet) [4,9 m]
divided into 36 lots (33 x 124 feet) [10,1 x 37,8 m]
Also compare to: Geoposition [randomly chosen] :
+41° 56' 34.65", -87° 46' 52.53"
According to various [net] sources the average [hence prevailing] Chicago lot size currently [still] equals 25 x 125 feet [7,6 x 38,1 m].
Use Google Earth's measuring tool and see for your self …
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XI.) Img. _09
Label: "QUADRUPLE HOUSING, EXTERIOR PLAN" providing: "ONE ACRE GARDEN" for each house, thus depicting an area of 4 acres [16187 m2].
Drawing from: 'The Living City' by Frank Lloyd Wright, published by Horizon Press, 1958,
page 150
http://www.archive.org/
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The Living City - 1958, by Frank Lloyd Wright
"[…] Also there is the plan of the quadruple in quadrangular
array widespread and beneficent instead of the standardized subdivision
based upon the ancient London dormitory town.
[page 171]" XI.) 18
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References:
- "Frank Lloyd Wright: His Life and His Architecture"
by Robert C. Twombly, published by Wiley-IEEE, 1987
http://books.google.at/
1 ^ » A Home in a Prairie Town « Page 53 shows a reproduction […] of the February 1901 article in "The Ladies' Home Journal" [http://www.steinerag.com/ 2].
» A Small House with 'Lots of Room in It' « [… 2] was also published in The Ladies' Home Journal July 1901. [http://www.steinerag.com/ 2 3]
"After explaining the plans and specifying the costs - $7000 for the 'Prairie' and $5800 for the 'Small' House - Wright declared himself ready to accept orders." [page 52] See also: XII.) 20
Details according to Twombly [page 56, note 14]
11 [page 224]
8 Key to plan [page 225, 226, 227] See also II.) Img. _04
Here [page 226] Wright's project is labelled » "Non-Competitive Plan" (1913) for the National Conference on City Planning « VII.) VIII.)
- ^ a b c "[Publications of The City Club of Chicago] City Residential Land Development:
Studies in Planning: Competitive Plans for Subdividing a Typical Quarter Section of Land in the
Outskirts of Chicago", edited by Alfred B. [Beaver] Yeomans [Landscape Architect], published by The University of Chicago Press, December 1916
PDF from http://www.archive.org/
"Program of a Competition
with Cash Prizes
for the procuring of a
Scheme of Development
for a Quarter-Section of Land
within the Limits of the
City of Chicago, Illinois
[…]
For good reasons it has been detemined that the area for the laying out
of which plans are to be submitted in this competition shall be, not a precisely
located, but an imaginary or an assumed site, as follows:" [page 1, 2]
Wilhelm Bernhard was awarded first prize, Arthur C. Comey
second, Albert and
Mrs. Ingrid Lilienberg third.
43 plans were submitted, 39 reported by the jury, 33 [including Wright's] published.
Illustrations of "NON-COMPETITIVE PLAN" or "PLAN BY FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT" for "CITY RESIDENTIAL LAND DEVELOPMENT" [Chicago City Club Competition 1913]
Img. _08 Bird's-Eye View of the Quarter-Section [page 97]
Img. _04 [Site] Plan including "KEY TO PLAN" and "STATISTICAL DATA" [page 98]
Img. _05 Quadruple Block Scheme C [page 100]
Img. _02_a not labelled, depicting a 'Prairie House' [page 101]
Img. _07 Standard City Block as used for computations [page 138]
5 "[…] A succession of buildings of any given length by this arrangement presents the aspect of well-grouped buildings in a park, of greater picturesque variety than is possible where façade follows façade." [Frank Lloyd Wright] (page 99)
See also IV.) 9
6 "EXPLANATION OF ALTERNATIVE BLOCK ARRANGEMENTS
A. Quadruple re-subdivision of city block by means of single
cross street and parterres into four sub-blocks. Four houses
grouped at center of each sub-block about an interior court
enclosed by low walls — 1/4 of the enclosure available to each
of the four houses.
One entrance to one house only on each side of each sub-block.
No alleys — houses revolving in plan so that living-rooms and verandas face outward and kitchens inward to
courts. A single plan used thus is always presented at a
different angle in harmonious groups of four.
B. Same. Single cross street — no parterres. Houses grouping
across the streets increasing interior court gardens and giving
direct access from street to all houses without parterres. […]" [page 101]
- 'Modern Architecture: Being the Kahn Lectures for 1930'
by Frank Lloyd Wright [published first 1931] with a new introduction by Neil Levine, published by Princeton University Press, 2008 http://books.google.at/
4 ^ " […] The 1912-13 project for a thirty-two-block residential area of Chicago done in the context of the Chicago City Club Competition for a Model Quarter-Section was designed in response to a request from the club's civic secretary, George Hooker, and is in no way an ideal, comprehensive city plan." XII.) 23
[Neil Levine, note 178, page lxix]
- ^ "Shaping the City: Studies in History, Theory and Urban Design"
by Rodolphe El-Khoury, Edward Robbins, published by Routledge, 2004
3 "[… because] Wright did not participate in competitions." Note 12, page 75 accredits that information to Neil Levine. XII.) 23
http://books.google.at/
14 [page 60] reproduction of Hoyt's diagram V.) 13 "Various methods of subdividing a 40 Acre Tract, 1320 Feet Square" [page 431, figure 103, type E]
9 ^ [page 61]
http://books.google.at/
- "One Hundred Years of Land Values in Chicago: The Relationship of the Growth of Chicago to the Rise of Its Land Values, 1830-1933"
by Homer Hoyt, Harry A. Millis, published by Beard Books, 2000 [published first in 1933]
16 [page 429]
13 "Various methods of subdividing a 40 Acre Tract, 1320 Feet Square" [page 431, figure 103, type E]
http://books.google.at/
Details according to El-Khoury and Robbins IV.) 14
- ^ "FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT: DIE LEBENDIGE STADT" edited by David G. De Long, published by Vitra Design Museum, Weil am Rhein / Skira editore, Milan, 1998
http://books.google.at/ (German)
Img. _02 "TAFEL XIII PRAIRIE-HAUS FÜR DIE PRAIRIE-GEMEINSCHAFT." - 1900 [Prairie House] by Frank Lloyd Wright [page 182]
Img. _03 Quadruple Block Plan by Frank Lloyd Wright [page 248]
- a b "The Birth of City Planning in the United States, 1840-1917" by Jon A. Peterson, JHU Press, 2003
"[…]
in 1912-1913 both the NCCP [National Conference on City Planning VIII.)] and the Chicago City Club had sponsored model-suburb design contests. The planners did so as a conference study-project, the City Club II.) as an open competition with prizes."
http://books.google.at/
[page 282]
- a b c The First National Conference on City Planning was held in Washington, D.C. in May 1909
PDF from http://www.archive.org/
The fifth conference took place in Chicago in May 1913
PDF from http://www.archive.org/
"While the goal
of our so-called city planning movement is the actual improvement
of cities, the translation of plans into facts,
[…] one of the big steps toward
that goal is the substitution of plans for mere talk about
plans or about the subjects with which plans deal. […]"
[page 168]
… making very general comments on 9 presented 'city planning studies' (page 93 onwards, list of participants page 210) and only one [!] reference to the City Club competition:
"We have also carried
out, as some of you saw yesterday at the City Club, a study
of a particular quarter section of a level city from a
theoretical standpoint." [page 189]
7
The Seventh National Conference on City Planning [Detroit June 1915] provides a brief history of Chicago block sizes.
http://www.archive.org/ [page 244 onwards]
- 'The Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright' by Neil Levine, published by Princeton University Press, 1996
Img. _01 Quadruple Block Plan - 1900, by Frank Lloyd Wright
published in "The Ladies' Home Journal" [http://www.steinerag.com/] February 1901
- 17 The competition program was issued in 1912; competition deadline was March 3, 1913; an exhibition at the club building was due to open March 7, 1913 II.) also displaying Wright's project. XII.) 23
19 ^ Img. _06 "Two-flat Buildings" [labelled "W" bottom left in Img. _04] are evidently larger consuming almost their entire lot. Nevertheless it seems [to me] that Wright used already existing Quadruple Block types [Img. _05] from the Roberts project to illustrate the Chicago City Club scheme - regardless of actual lot dimensions implied by its site plan [Img. _04]. But from the plan-reproductions available to me, I really can't tell …
For the same reason block sizes of 270 x 600 feet [as featured in Img. _06, based on graphic approximation and competition guidelines] are strictly speaking speculative as are relating / resulting lot dimensions!
- 'The Living City' by Frank Lloyd Wright, published by Horizon Press, 1958
Img. _09 [page 150]
18 Apartments … [page 171]
- IN: 'Frank Lloyd Wright: From Within Outward' published on the occasion of the exhibition 'Frank Lloyd Wright: From Within Outward' at the Guggenheim Museum NY 2009, by Skira Rizzoli Publications Inc. 2009
'Making Community Out of the Grid: WRIGHT'S QUADRUPLE BLOCK PLAN AND THE ORIGIN OF THE PRAIRIE HOUSE' by Neil Levine [page 58 to 73]
20 ^ Page 65 shows also I.) 1 a reproduction […] of the February 1901 article published in "The Ladies' Home Journal" [http://www.steinerag.com/ 2].
"A Home in a Prairie Town
BY FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT
This is the Fifth Design in the Journal's New Series of Model Suburban Houses Which Can be Built at Moderate Cost"
"[…] Cement on metal lath is suggested for the exterior covering throughout, because it is simple, and, as now understood, durable and cheap. The cost of this house with interior as specified and cement construction would be seven thousand dollars: […]
Total … $6970"
[ensued by an] "EDITOR'S NOTE - As a guarantee that the plan of this house is practicable, and that the estimates for cost are conservative, the architect is ready to accept the commission of preparing the working plans and specifications for this house to cost Seven Thousand Dollars […]"
21 ^ All figures according to Neil Levine pages 66, 67, 68, who also gives a detailed account of the actual geometries developed for the Roberts project [Img. _03].
22 [page 68]
Wright replaced standard "multipurpose alleys" with pedestrian ways called 'esplanades' and vehicular passages called 'courts'. He also had a version for the Roberts project [Img. _03] drawn "with the lots squared up as much as possible" [page 70], thus "increasing the length of the block (to the inside of the sidewalks) from 465 to 558 feet." [page 73, note 21]
23 ^ a b c Page 73; Note 26 resolves the procedures regarding the Chicago City Club Housing Competition.
- 'You Dear Old Prima Donna: The Letters
of Frank Lloyd Wright and Jens Jensen' by Virginia L. Russell, FASLA, published in Landscape Journal 2001; 20:2; PDF [pages 141-155]
24 "[…] In 1913, the Chicago City Club,
when Jensen was their Chair of City Planning,
held a competition for the design of a suburban
community, and Wright did not enter his
design, which evolved into the Broadacre City,
in the competition, instead choosing to submit
the scheme “hors concours,” as one reviewer
put it, or “outside the competition.” Jensen
was on the jury for the competition, and it
would be a dispute over Broadacre City that ultimately
ended their friendship thirty years
later. […]" [page 154, note 8]
- IN: 'Center: A Journal of Architecture in America', 'Modernist Visions and the Contemporary American City' - Volume 5, published in 1989 by the Center of the Study of American Architecture, School of Architecture, The University of Texas at Austin. http://soa.utexas.edu/
'Broadacre City: The Reception of a Modernist Vision, 1932-1988' by Anthony Alofsin [pages 8 - 43]
25 [pages 11, 12]
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Links
http://books.google.at/
http://www.archive.org/ 2 3
http://books.google.at/
http://books.google.at/
http://books.google.at/
http://books.google.at/
http://cybergeo.revues.org/
http://www.metroplanning.org/ [404]
http://www.daimi.au.dk/
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more Broadacre
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File Log
- Outlining Broadacre City became necessary in the course of my urban diploma project 16/3 in 1999. Put online the same year in German, this 'preliminary' English translation became available in 2007.
- All links to http://contentdm.unl.edu/ [University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries] have been updated (25.11.2008).
- Links to
http://www.mcah.columbia.edu/ [Columbia University in the City of New York] added (2.8.2009)
- All dates according to source [!]. Wikipedia and 'The Complete Works' by Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer accomplish [even here] a certain 'conventionalisation', superseding conflicting 'chronologies' supported by [prior] publications of the time.
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