Wright Chat

I went by there on Friday Oct 14th. The rennovation looks great!!!! The house is open for tours to the generalmpublic starting Oct 15th. It is a shame of the condition of some of the other houses on the street.



Here is a link to the house.

http://www.westcotthouse.org/

I've been in the house a few times, albeit when it was apartments. It sure is sad what some people do to homes...and you're right about the other homes in the area; however, one must keep in mind the general economy of Springfield...rather depressed for the past 50 years or so. I've been watching the restoration progress and am simply amazed that the citizens of Springfield are doing it right!



Well done!

Just a couple of notes:



The last owner of the house did her best to keep it up. She was overwhelmed and the previous owners before her did a band-aid job on many repairs. As a result, she got stuck with years of problems them materialized on her watch. Some numbers were run on her finances when she was getting ready to sell the house and it was discovered that she spent a greater percentage of her available income on that house than any other Wright house owner. (Can we say "money pit?") The restoration took $5+ million and the vast majority of that came out of a local philanthropic foundation and not out of someone's personal checkbook. Additionally money is being sought by the Westcott House Foundation from the government (that means the tax dollars that YOU pay). That's a lot to ask of someone owning one of these houses, especially one as large as Westcott.



Also, very few people of Springfield were involved in truly restoring this house. The board of Westcott is now in charged of running the house, but the Conservancy dictated the terms and condition under which the house would be restored and they found the architect to do it. The Westcott house Foundation complains about the easement at most every turn, but its that easement that dictated how the house will be restored, less the restoration quality would be subordinated by its potential to make money, etc. The Conservancy is out of Chicago, the architect is out of Akron (and others from Columbus) and the Durable Slate Company (the contractor) is out of Columbus. I will say we did have some extraordinary artisans from the Springfield area, especially in the area of woodworking (the dining room table, the children playroom furniture, etc.)



The houses along Greenmount are another entire battle. When the Westcott House Foundation purchased these houses, they were in OK condition. They looked generally fine from the street and would have needed a simple cleaning and yard-upkeep to keep them looking fine. Many battles in board meetings occurred over these houses. (I was a board member for a while) and some board members (like the Vice President who was one of the Westcott House Foundation founders) and project staff not only left the project over the battles over the houses themselves, but over the back-room way the board leadership was dealing with it. As a result, this board and project have NO preservation people on it and the board's attitude now is to tear down all these houses (some predate Westcott and are contextual to the Westcott house) and build something modern and new using Stanley Tigerman and some other architects. The Conservancy and the National Park Service have voiced major concern about this as doing so will damage the contextual environment of Westcott. The Westcott House Foundation is not nor has ever been interested in deferring to any preservation issues and are very antipathetic toward trying to use SOME of the existing houses for alternate uses as has been suggested by preservation and tourism experts who know lot more about this sort of thing than WHF does.



In all likelihood, those houses will be torn down and some sort of "tourism disneyland" will be built to help attract more people to make Westcott a viable income producing enterprise. But as of yet, its all concept ideas with no basis for practical operation and no signs of economic viability other than people who think its neat and will have to be successful.



But back to the house itself...If you want to know who to thank for the house, take it from someone who was there on the ground floor before there was a Westcott House Foundation, before there was anything other than a dream to save the house. The people to thank and appreciate are Sherri Snyder (last owner of the house) and the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy, architect Lauren Burge (of Chambers, Murphy and Burge) and her team (including Schooly-Caldwell of Columbus), Durable Slate and their subs and the Turner Foundation for funding the project.



Those are they people who saved and restored the house. I was there and working on this house for 10 years, and I saw it.



Matt Cline

Former Westcott House Foundation Board Member

Former Westcott House Foundation Site Manager

Former FLW Building Conservancy Site Manager for Westcott emergency stabilization

I remember and followed your early involvement; what a sad situation. I knew as soon as I read about "Tigerman and the gang of three unknowns" that all was not well, reminiscent of the Price Tower debacle (never get me to accept that horror they want to build there).



The contextual neighborhood is definitely integral to any Wright design, especially since many no longer exist as in Springfield, and if the "experts" involved don't understand that their credibility is surely suspect.



Is it a simple matter of the "money people" calling the shots once the real work has been done?

Hi everyone. I would like to invite everyone to visit the Westcott House in Springfield, Ohio. I had the fortunate opportunity to be the "Proxy" grandchild to Nancy Willey the impetus and project manager of the Willey house in Minneapolis Mn. I grew up with the facinating humanistic stories of it its construction and life in a FLW house. Thought I never felt the experience until I walked into the Westcott with the true feeling of being inside on one hand and thrusted outward and being in contact with the surrounding nature. Being the project manager of the Westcott House for the last four years has been a challenge and a reward. The evolution of the space from selectively demolishing the infill of the created apartments the returning it to a restored 1909 era home has been a chore. Adhearing to the NPS Sec. of Interior Standards of Historic Preservation and attention to detail will please all scholars. Mr. Thomas Schmidt of the FLWBC just visited the property and commented it is a "World Class" restoration. Hats off to Chambers Murphy and Burge, Schooley Cladwell Associates, Carol Yetken CYLA Design, Elwin Robison, Structural Engineer, The Durable Slate Company Hauck Brothers HVAC, Triec Electric, Aggressive Mechanical, Central Fire Protection, Hard Fire Suppression Service, Loopmaster International and Crabtree Well Drilling, Mock Woodworking, Art Woodworking and MFG., Co. TA VanAuker Woodworks, G. Keener and CO., Ted Bolle Millworks, Calaway Design and Finish, G. Whitley Painting, Flooring Foundations, Niklas-Freeman Flooring, Applied Solar Technologies, Hays Fabricating and Welding, Glawe Awning and our many suppliers and vendors who assisted with this project who are the unsung heros of this project with thier diligence and craftsmenship have created a lasting space to be enjoyed by all.



D. Shawn Beckwith

Project Manager

The Durable Slate Company

www.durableslate.com



PS If you are going to the conference in LA they have a preliminary video created by Kerry Rasikas who also assisted with the Meyer-May restoration video.