Wright Chat

at the risk of starting a BIG discussion about Charnley, I believe its commonly accepted that the basic design of the house came from Sullivan. In most architectural firms, the principal (and the person responsible for bringing the job into the office) establishes the basic design parameters, and th...

I've been in the house on Asbury - well before all the "improvements". The owner at that time made the claim about Wright as well, but I believe that George Maher was responsible for the various additions and rehab in 1902.

Hans Geyer was a very talented architect from Racine - and accomplished many homes in a somewhat Usonian/international style. Never worked with Wright. This home was owned by Ray Farley, one of the only non-Johnson family members to head up Johnson Wax. We found him to be a wonderful, thoughtful cli...

the technique of sending a mouse with an attached wire through the 1-1/2" piping is feasible only if the pipes have radiused corners, which many of them do. It was first successfully used in refrigeration warehouses in california, and would certainly work on radiant heating systems as well. The...

radiant heating systems are wonderful when they work, disasters when they don't. The heating systems that many owners love to hate. Ultimately they are destined to fail - oxidation in piping, be it steel, wrought iron or copper will eventually cause leaks and require repair and/or replacement. There...

I wondered about that too roderick. Some kind of transition is needed at the second floor because the top plate is slightly lower than the ceiling rafters, so curved, or angled, it would have been necessary. I don't understand the curved ceiling/wall at the first floor, however, since there is no ne...

my point being that demo and carpentry work will be needed before the roofing contractor can do his thing. I"ve had good results from A.B. Edwards roofing co.

lol - I was waiting for that - and you seem to neglect mentioning that the Ross House would have certainly been demolished had I not spent hundreds of thousand of dollars fixing it - which, using your logic, would allow me to do whatever I wanted so that "some guy from Chicago wouldn't come in ...

please read the attached secretary of interior standards for restoration - and then compare to the work done on the house: Standards for Restoration 1. A property will be used as it was historically or be given a new use which reflects the property's restoration period. 2. Materials and features fro...

hello, in looking at the photos it appears that the roofs were built with inadequate slope, or pitch. I believe the remedy will involve either removing the existing roofing, installing sloped sleepers with new plywood sheathing prior to installing a new roof -it may also be solved by using sloped ri...

sorry Mark, I know this is a deeply personal issue for you, but the right thing would have been restoring the windows and putting them back in the house. If that was considered impossible, I would think that a tax-deductible gift would be appropriate. Selling windows always gives the impression that...

if you google hardy house windows there appears to have been 3 sales, a single, a pair, and a group of 3. I am feeling a little uneasy with posting this information, especially since so much work was done to restore this incredible home, but I do feel its important to re-emphasize what, exactly, res...

the "replica" windows will not match the originals, as they were fabricated using a copper-plating technique over zinc caming. I would anticipate that the new windows would cost about $500 or so. Also, thank you SDR, I can now see that the "replicas" do not match the original, an...

https://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2018/luxe-decorative-arts-n09845/lot.1413.html surprised to see that Sothebys auctioned off a total of six windows from the house removed during the most recent "restoration" - Each window fetched about $6000. Sad that Gene didn't do "th...

thank you - it was a solution that worked well in two ways: added insulation and elimination of those horrible built-in gutters.