Frank lloyd Wright designed Turkel House, Detroit

RJH · Post by **RJH** » Sun May 13, 2007 8:23 pm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdziNtPhrdw

SDR · Post by **SDR** » Sun May 13, 2007 11:48 pm

Oy. There goes another one. . .

Architecture: Painting/Sculpture at the mercy of its residents. No one messes with the Mona Lisa; if you customize a '49 Mercury there are others. A house like this is unique, yet completely vulnerable.

I suppose the covered-over block walls will still BE there. . .under the studs and sheetrock.

SDR

RJH · Post by **RJH** » Mon May 14, 2007 12:20 am

SDR,

I am so glad

LikaComet · Post by **LikaComet** » Mon May 14, 2007 5:09 am

Forgive my impertanence but on some of these later taliesen houses they just don't seem to have the Wright "pop". I wonder how much involvement Mr. Wright had in the actual construction of this house. The best part of the house is the drawings and the general appearance. Inside it just seems a little odd. Somehow a little "off".

This is just a turshery observation on my part. As usual I might be wrong.

MHOLUBAR · Post by **MHOLUBAR** » Mon May 14, 2007 7:59 am

This is really an unfair remark;

Maybe the Fallingwater folks can view this and get some

RJH · Post by **RJH** » Mon May 14, 2007 8:17 am

Unfair is molesting a Wright design.

You are telling me you can

Roderick Grant · Post by **Roderick Grant** » Mon May 14, 2007 3:04 pm

Perhaps I'm just too old, but I have never understood this recent fascination with monster bathrooms. It takes me mere minutes to shower, and I don't have nor need an entire room-sized stall to do it. Another Usonian Automatic to get the bigger-is-better bathroom treatment is the late Adelman House in Phoenix, and it did not add one whit to the design, but detracted significantly from it. They added an entire master bedroom wing to the house that ruined the whole concept; at least Turkel is not being expanded. I hope they keep their alterations to the minor areas of the house and lavish nothing but restoration on the main rooms.

SDR · Post by **SDR** » Mon May 14, 2007 10:23 pm

Yes -- and of course it's perfectly possible that a commendable job, with appropriate materials (is that a new or an old piece of ribbon-stripe veneered material in one photo ?) will be done. Perhaps that is a sensitive master carpenter giving the "tour." Perhaps MHOLUBAR knows something we don't. But boarding over the natural fabric of the house in several places isn't a great sign.

(And the tour guide doesn't seem to appreciate that the bedroom with the built-ins doesn't NEED a "headboard"; what's there IS the headboard !)

I too bathe (and sleep) in minimal comfort, with the main space of my quarters having the wealth of light, spacial richness and view. This formula has well-served a hundred years (and counting) of modern life. . .

SDR

archfan · Post by **archfan** » Wed May 16, 2007 2:01 am

While I understand the ideal of exactly preserving Wright's houses as designed, let's inject some reality. If Norman and Dale hadn't bought the Turkel house, it would have joined hundreds of other Detroit houses demolished by neglect. From what I saw when I toured the house last fall, shortly after the sale of the house, it had already started down that road.

In the balance, saving the Turkel house from the bulldozers vs. turning one of the kids' rooms into a bathroom is a good trade.

pharding · Post by **pharding** » Wed May 16, 2007 6:08 am

I agree completely that turning one of the kids' bedrooms into a master bathroom is a small price to pay for saving the house. A similar strategy was successfully used on the Heurtley House Restoration.

RJH · Post by **RJH** » Wed May 16, 2007 8:09 am

I also agree that it is better for a Wright house to be bought and altered rather then having it bulldozed.

Turkel was never at that stage. The property was in foreclosure and the bank was looking to sell it. More buyers (perhaps better owners) could have been found if they asking price was lower.

It is also more then just converting a bedroom into a bathroom.

- Original closets appear to have been torn out.

- Plywood kitchen cabinets ripped out. Perhaps they are going to Home Depot for new modern day cabinets.

- I saw one part of the video where hallway cabinets were removed and another part of the video where they are still there.

I hope they save all the pieces.

The Heurtley bathroom conversion stood out as odd and was one of the first things I noticed.

jlesshafft · Post by **jlesshafft** » Wed May 16, 2007 8:13 am

RJH - "save all the pieces"...isn't that a little hypocritical?

If everyone is so upset, the only question that can and should be asked is why didn't you buy it and hire a qualified restoration architect and turn it into a "dead" museum house.

RJH · Post by **RJH** » Wed May 16, 2007 8:28 am

I am absolutely not kidding when I say save the pieces. On Haynes, the former owner discarded folding accordion doors, linen closets among other items. When I tried to reproduce the damaged items it turned out the tracks for the doors were no longer made. The piano hinges were impossible to find and I had to get them custom made to match the originals in the house by S&S Hinge in Chicago. Furthermore, with lumber and labor the work was too costly and complicated to reproduce. We

jlesshafft · Post by **jlesshafft** » Wed May 16, 2007 3:01 pm

RJH - no I'm referring to the original parts of the Haynes house you sold off. Shouldn't those have been kept?

Or does your advice to keep all the parts not apply to you?

RJH · Post by **RJH** » Wed May 16, 2007 3:20 pm

The parts that were sold were all broken and replaced with exact same barnd new parts.

Wright Chat

Frank lloyd Wright designed Turkel House, Detroit

Frank lloyd Wright designed Turkel House, Detroit

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