Mapmaker: Wright, Frank Lloyd
(Thematic - Architecture) Broadacre City
1958
(Thematic - Architecture) Broadacre City, Frank Lloyd Wright, 1958
"A New Freedom For Living In America"
It was the ongoing dream of the great American architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, to not only change the style and nature of buildings, but of American life, its cities and suburbs included. This map for his idealized city, Broadacre City, would be a place where, "an acre of ground minimum for the individual" would be allotted, and an astounding list of other concerns would be addressed from "No Slum. No Scum." to "No traffic problem. No back and forth haul", "No major or minor axis". It would be the end of the city as we know it and the highest evolution of the suburb, and a reworking of community and daily life. Of course the construction would be dictated by the environment itself, much like Olmstead's ideals, but this map layout a potential scheme for a complete society, from its water supply and apartment houses to "little farms", "little homes", the place of "Universal worship" and the cemetery.
While many loved Frank Lloyd Wright's uncompromising, almost prophetic, vision for how Americans should live, some took his cult of personality to another level. Indeed, Ayn Rand's protagonist in "The Fountainhead", Howard Roark, was based on Frank Lloyd Wright and his clearly defined take on the world. But while Wright had helped define an American style of house in the Midwest, he seemed to just object to cities as they had organically sprouted, and apparently wanted to diminish urban density and push people back to the land, automobile dependence and an ideal of endless small towns. So while Frank Lloyd Wright was convinced that excellent architectural design could solve a majority of society's problems, in actuality, he seems to have lacked any evidence, transitional plan or even flexibility in how to improve urban life.
Condition is very good. Image size is approximately 18 x 28.5 (inches)
"A New Freedom For Living In America"
It was the ongoing dream of the great American architect, Frank Lloyd Wright, to not only change the style and nature of buildings, but of American life, its cities and suburbs included. This map for his idealized city, Broadacre City, would be a place where, "an acre of ground minimum for the individual" would be allotted, and an astounding list of other concerns would be addressed from "No Slum. No Scum." to "No traffic problem. No back and forth haul", "No major or minor axis". It would be the end of the city as we know it and the highest evolution of the suburb, and a reworking of community and daily life. Of course the construction would be dictated by the environment itself, much like Olmstead's ideals, but this map layout a potential scheme for a complete society, from its water supply and apartment houses to "little farms", "little homes", the place of "Universal worship" and the cemetery.
While many loved Frank Lloyd Wright's uncompromising, almost prophetic, vision for how Americans should live, some took his cult of personality to another level. Indeed, Ayn Rand's protagonist in "The Fountainhead", Howard Roark, was based on Frank Lloyd Wright and his clearly defined take on the world. But while Wright had helped define an American style of house in the Midwest, he seemed to just object to cities as they had organically sprouted, and apparently wanted to diminish urban density and push people back to the land, automobile dependence and an ideal of endless small towns. So while Frank Lloyd Wright was convinced that excellent architectural design could solve a majority of society's problems, in actuality, he seems to have lacked any evidence, transitional plan or even flexibility in how to improve urban life.
Condition is very good. Image size is approximately 18 x 28.5 (inches)