Show Low to Phoenix continued: Mile 7128.6

Americana, The Big Trip

Our goal for the day had been to get to Taliesin West – Frank Lloyd Wright’s western architectural school, and, we were to learn, the mothership of the Wright cult – for the four o’clock tour, have an anniversary dinner somewhere in greater Phoenix and spend the night in the western part of Phoenix, so we could easily get to Los Angeles the next day. We made it to Taliesin with lots of time to spare thanks to Google Maps and Phoenix’s excellent highway and boulevard system. 

Phoenix has a series of highways around it which make for easy travel but keep the traveler from actually experiencing the city. This is a problem we had everywhere, when we spend only one or two nights in even a small city, there just isn’t time to get a real feeling for it.  
Once off the freeway, we were on boulevards lined with walled houses.

In 1968-69, I worked in Phoenix, part-time, as the Construction Manager on the John Gardener Tennis Ranch on Camelback but I never visited Taliesin West. Thinking about going there on this trip, I sort of wondered Why? I have been to Wright’s Imperial Hotel in Tokyo when I was there in the 60s but didn’t see the Guggenheim in New York or any Wright-designed house until later (except the Morris Shop on Maiden Lane in San Francisco, one of my favorite places). Thinking about going to Taliesin, I remembered back to those buildings as great. Now, after Taliesin, I still think they are all great but I had forgotten that they were really not very good. What I mean by that is that the buildings were great as sculpture, as showcases for Frank Lloyd Wright, but they were not very livable or, even, usable.

The Hollyhock House on Olive Hill is terrific and it is my favorite Wright house, so far, but I wouldn’t want to live in it; it just wouldn’t really be very livable without some major remodeling like opening it up to the spectacular view. The Guggenheim is another example; the expanding spiral that is the center of Wright’s design is striking from the outside – although, as I remember, there was a lot of criticism when it was built in that it didn’t fit in with the surrounding buildings, Wright’s answer was that everything else was bad architecture and he couldn’t be expected to match them – and makes a great entry inside but it is not a very good place  to show art (it is easy to get too close to a work of art and OK to see from across the way but impossible to see anything from ten steps back and the slant and curved wall don’t help). The Guggenheim is, however, a great place to see Wright’s particular genius and so is Taliesin.

On the way there, we made reservations for a tour which we picked up in the Gift Shop. The Gift Shop was one of the few shops we’ve been to on the trip that had more books than trinkets and the books were almost all on Wright. The only other architect that I can remember being represented was Louis Kahn.
There was much to admire at Taliesin but the tour guide was not one of them. The tour just didn’t click for us and I think a good part of that was the guide. 
 In 1937, Wright, with his third wife, Olgivanna, bought land in Arizona (for $3.50 an acre). He wanted to start a western version of his architectural school in Wisconsin, Taliesin Studio, as well as a winter home. He called it Taliesin West and the students would help build it. 1937 was the height – low? – of the Depression and, and despite having several major contracts during the 30s, Wright was pretty close to broke (well, broke for a guy with a house in Wisconsin and land in Arizona). At Taliesin, he had his students fill the concrete wall forms with local rocks both to save money and to showcase his use of local materials. I liked the use of rough concrete with the rocks, Michele didn’t (Wright’s students were the contractor and the workmanship was often rude and, I suspect, that better workmanship would have helped). 
Originally Taliesin was a winter encampment with stretched canvas for the ceilings/roofing. Changing the ceilings to fiberglass to accommodate air-conditioning is more practical but the design suffers for it, in my opinion.
A couple of months ago, as I remember it, Michele and Aston were discussing FLW and Aston said he didn’t think he was the greatest, that Wright didn’t compare to Le Corbusier because, among other reasons, Wright’s ceilings are too low and his rooms claustrophobic. After touring Taliesin, I think Aston is right.
The tour ended in a small auditorium – with great acoustics – where we were given a pitch to join the Taliesin Institute. I felt like I was being given a pitch to join a cult. It left me feeling a little ripped off.

We finished the day part of our day watching the sun go down from Taliesin which is when I took the picture on top. Wright was still there when the power lines were put in and he objected by calling his Congressman but he was old, the world had changed, and the power lines went in. After gassing up – at Cosco – we went to the Twisted Grove for a very good, but not particularly memorable Anniversary dinner. Then it was a short drive across town – on expressways and Interstate 10 – to a motel.  

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