A Weekend in Phoenix

     Earlier this winter our Volunteer Co-Chair, Phyllis Spears, and her cohort, Al Kelley (also a GC volunteer) made a weekend trip to the Phoenix area to visit Frank Lloyd Wright designed buildings.  They did an intensive Behind the Scenes Tour of Taliesen West which has already been written about here, but being thorough, they did not stop there.  The Phoenix AZ area is similar to the Buffalo area in that it has a grouping of FLW designed buildings, but partially because FLW's working location was housed locally at Taliesen West and possibly because he was well known in the area because of that, there is a much larger grouping of commissioned buildings there.  Phyllis' research indicated that there were 11 of them and in one weekend they successfully made the effort to visit them all.

     Phyllis reports that most of the buildings are residences and privately owned and not available for touring, but they did their best.  They did drive-bys; they parked and sneaked around neighborhoods trying to get better views without being arrested as possible burglars and at least claim to have committed no acts of trespassing.

     They visited the Biltmore Hotel which technically was not a Wright commission.  The architect of record was Albert Chase McArthur, an apprentice of Wright's from his Oak Park years.  Wright was called in as a kind of consultant, but his hand is very clearly evident in the design of the building to anyone familiar with his design style and it is commonly accepted as at least being heavily influenced by his involvement.

                                                               The Biltmore Hotel

     Another of his public designs was the First Christian Church.  It was originally designed by FLW in 1938 as the Southwest Christian Seminary, but the organization ceased to exist and the building was not built until about  1970 (like many things concerning FLW, different sources cite different dates for completion ranging from 1967 to 1974.)  Mrs. Wright gave permission for the Church to use the previously unbuilt design.  This building is not open for tours on the weekend which was when Phyllis and Al were there and the only way to view the interior was to actually attend the Sunday morning worship service.  This was not a good idea as far as Al Kelley was concerned.  He did not want to shoulder the responsibility of having the roof cave in due to his presence, but Phyllis reports that she talked him into it rather easily.  They were impressed not only with the building but with the warmness with which the congregation accepted her and Al.

                                                              First Christian Church

     They also visited the Grady Grammage Auditorium on the Arizona State University campus in Tempe.  This was one of Wright's last designs and was actually intended originally as a design for an opera house in Baghdad which was never built. The Auditorium was completed following Wright's death  and opened in 1964

                                               ASU Grady Grammage Memorial Auditorium

     The Frank Lloyd Wright Quarterly for Winter 2012 featured FLW in Arizona and actually lists 59 of his designs for the Phoenix area.  Many were never actually built and others are no longer standing.  Good thing!  I can't imagine Phyllis and Al being able to see 59 buildings in one weekend, but then again we are talking about Phyllis and Al!  Thank you to both for sharing the photos and the story of their trip with me so I can share them with all of you..