Article: Griggs House (Tacoma, WA) open for a tour

DavidC · Post by **DavidC** » Mon Jul 30, 2012 1:36 pm

Tour a Frank Lloyd Wright home in Lakewood

David

DRN · Post by **DRN** » Tue Jul 31, 2012 11:49 am

The Griggs house has, for me, always seemed apart from the rest of Wright's work...and not in a bad way, it is just different. I'm not sure if the roof trusses or the diagonal siding are throwing me, but the house seems almost of a different hand. There are some unbuilt house designs toward the end of the '30's and into the early '40's, that seem to have this quality that I can't seem to put into words. This is not to say Wright didn't design these, but I wonder if he had an idea or concept parallel to the doctrinaire Usonians or an idea that was a derivative of them that went relatively unexplored or he simply lost interest in.

I'll try to look up some examples in Mono #6 to note.
Any similar reactions from other Chatters?

DavidC · Post by **DavidC** » Tue Jul 31, 2012 12:01 pm

I would agree w/ you on Griggs, too. I also put the Grant House into the "apart from the rest of Wright's work" category. And as you said, not in a bad way for either of them - just a different concept that ended up not being frequently used thereafter.

David

Wrightgeek · Post by **Wrightgeek** » Tue Jul 31, 2012 1:06 pm

I visited the Griggs Residence within the past 6 months, and I would tend to agree that within the oveure of Wright's residential work, this is indeed a different bird. From what I know of the project, this may have been a case of Wright allowing the client's wishes to negatively influence the outcome of the finished product.

First off, the site upon which this house rests is truly magnificient. It is a serene sanctuary within a suburban setting, probably measuring several acres in size, some of which is wooded, and some open meadow. To enter the house after parking your vehicle, you must cross a bridge which traverses a very substantial creek, which imbues the property with the beautiful sounds of rushing water.

The house itself is quite large, approx. 4000-5000sf, and as a result the scale of some of the interior spaces seemed a bit off to to me. And from what I understand, Wright's original plan for the house was to pay homage to the Pacific Northwest setting, by using stone and timbers, a plan that was nixed by the clients due to cost concerns. Remnants of this theme can still be seen in the finished product, with a huge stone fireplace and exposed interior trusses that give the appearance of massive rough sawn timbers.

An interesting Usonian (on steroids) that is not one of my favorites. It does make the most of the available solar potential due to its strategic orientation and glazing, which is one of the highlighs of the plan to me. However, I would have liked to see Wright be able to realize his original vision for this plan, but I guess it was just not meant to be.

Paul Ringstrom · Post by **Paul Ringstrom** » Tue Jul 31, 2012 1:17 pm

Wrightgeek wrote: I would have liked to see Wright be able to realize his original vision for this plan, but I guess it was just not meant to be.

Those darn clients always mess things up!

Just think of what FLW could have built without any clients!

Roderick Grant · Post by **Roderick Grant** » Tue Jul 31, 2012 2:17 pm

I disagree about the quality of the Griggs design. It's first rate. It accommodates the Griggs' desire for an art gallery and a room for chamber music. The generous scale (7'x7' grid) and high ceilings are appropriate for an art gallery.

The only compromises were in materials (concrete block, not the intended stone) and an alteration to the entrance process (access to the carport was changed), which was probably done without FLW's approval.

In the Dover reissue of Geo. Wm. Sheldon's "Artistic Country Seats," number 46 is a 15,000 sf, 22-room, $50,000 mansion on Summit Avenue in St. Paul, built in 1883 for Chauncey W. Griggs, "merchant, grocer, railroad builder, coal dealer, lumberman, banker and Minnesota legislator. In the late 1880s he moved to Tacoma, Washington, to head the St. Paul and Tacoma Lumber Co." Chauncey W. was Chauncey L.'s grandfather.

Wrightgeek · Post by **Wrightgeek** » Tue Jul 31, 2012 10:29 pm

RGrant-

I did not question the quality of the plan, I mentioned only that it was not to my liking. From all accounts, the Griggs enjoyed their FLW home very much, and hosted many spectacular events and parties there. And after all, that is what is most important, that the client gets a home that they can enjoy spending their lives in, right? Who are we to say?

DRN · Post by **DRN** » Wed Aug 01, 2012 9:12 am

To further my earlier post in this thread, the following are some unbuilt projects Wright designed in 1940-41 that seem to have a different "character" from many of his other projects at the time:

Farm cottage for EJ Kaufmann, 1940: It is kind of Usonian, but then again it isn't completely, at least to my eye. Something about its form, use of vertical boards, I'm not sure...It seeems more "Spring Green" than strict Usonian.

"Oak Shelter" Cottage for John Barton, 1941: This house's plan seems unlike any other plan for a Wright client I have seen...the grammar almost reminds me of an unbuilt design for a segment of Taliesin. I really like this house for some reason, possibly because it so unusual. The blurring of enclosure at the corner of the "L"; the enormous expanse of un-mullioned glass in the living area...I picture it as a great design for a vacation house in Pennsylvania's Pocono Mountains.

Studio Residence for Mary Waterstreet, 1941: The roof form is unusual, and the plan seems to be an ancestor of the Cooperative Homesteads in Detroit, and the Keys house in Rochester, MN.

Deke · Post by **Deke** » Wed Aug 01, 2012 9:13 am

It would be nice to see the house, but $45 is a bit much for seeing one home. Is it really 4-5000 sq ft? The plans seems quite simple, but perhaps it's simply a super-sized Usonian.

Roderick Grant · Post by **Roderick Grant** » Wed Aug 01, 2012 12:57 pm

Deke, by my measurement, Griggs is 3577 sf ... give or take.

DRN, if you look at FLW's career overall, you will find that during slow periods, such as the post Oak Park years from 1911 through WWII when few commissions were coming in, FLW was constantly experimenting with new forms. The cottage for Kaufmann (not dissimilar to Oboler Studio-Residence Project of 1946) is almost one of a kind, sharing only the most tangential relationship to another farm unit for Wingspread. The Barton and Waterstreet projects are distant cousins in their approach to planning, and the roof design for Waterstreet (similar to, yet different from Barton) finally saw its realization in Fasbender. FLW had no "down time"; when work was light, he still kept busy coming up with new ideas. Keep in mind that when the Kaufmann commission came into the office, he went further afield from his earlier work than ever before.