Beside all the housing schemes and blocks of flats, there are many unique and
beautiful buildings. These buildings take their inspiration, not from what is the
quickest way to build a house, but from their natural environment.
Fallingwater is such a building. It was designed and built by Frank Lloyd Wright, a
renowned American architect, in the 1930s and is considered by many to be a work
well ahead of its time. Fallingwater is situated on a rocky site above a waterfall, and is
surrounded by trees and streams. Its basic construction is from a native stone, with
concrete for the horizontal elements. These two completely different materials, the
smooth pale yellow concrete against the darker, rougher stone, provide a contrast
which helps the house to blend in with its environment, as well as being pleasing to
look at.
Frank Lloyd Wright once said of Fallingwater, ‘Fallingwater is a great blessing —
one of the greatest blessings to be experienced here on earth.’ Some would think that
this may have been rather pretentious of him, but we only have to look at the house to
see what a uniquely astounding building it actually is.
Fallingwater is a prime example of Organic Architecture, which is the term Frank
Lloyd Wright used to describe his approach to architectural design. The basic aim of
Organic Architecture is to set each individual building into its own environment, in
other words, to make it seem as though the building was naturally occurring in its
environment. To do this, Frank Lloyd Wright had to take all the inspiration for his
buildings from the environment in which they were going to be set.
And he could not have found a more interesting or varied environment than he did for
Fallingwater. All the elements of nature are present in that single landscape — water,
stone and wood are all plentiful, and gave Wright the opportunity to design an
amazing building. Fallingwater was born. And we can see that it meets Wright’s
organic ideals perfectly — the stone used in the building is at one with that found by
the stream, the concrete blends in perfectly with the light greens of the trees
surrounding it. Fallingwater sits in perfect harmony with its environment, and almost
compliments the forest, rock and stream surrounding it.
Another building, which is based on the same principles as those which Frank Lloyd
Wright used when designing Fallingwater, is the Maggie’s Centre, by the famous
architect Frank Gehry. The Maggie’s Centre was designed in 2003 as a care home for
those suffering from cancer. The philosophy behind the Maggie’s Centres is that your
immediate environment affects your well-being, and that these intimate buildings will
be the first step in helping many cancer sufferers manage their fears.
Architecture is critical to the concept of the Maggie’s Centre, which is ‘a reaction
against the institutional environment of hospitals and a determination to create a
friendlier place in which sufferers can personally deal with the disease.
Gehry said of the Maggie’s Centre, ‘I hope the architecture won’t override the
purpose of the building, but compliment it and take it to a higher plane of comfort and
beauty.’ Which, in my opinion at least, it does.
The first thing that you notice about the Maggie’s Centre is its remarkable roof.
Surprisingly, Gehry based his design for this amazing structure upon a shawl he once
saw on a woman in a portrait. He went to see the portrait with Maggie Jencks, who
was a close friend of his, and was also the Maggie the centre is named after, as she
died from cancer.
The roof is constructed from a latticework of Finnish Pine, with stainless steel plates
on top. These reflect the clouds drifting past, and also bring out the colour of the Tay
Estuary behind. The complex roof is jagged like grey mountain peaks, and each pitch
and angle of it is different. Another unusual feature of the roof is that it has no gutter.
Instead the rainwater cascades off the roof into specially designed ‘soakaways’ in the
ground.
Another distinguishing feature of the building is the white tower, for which Gehry
based his design on a lighthouse. The smooth white tower in contrast with the dark
sharp roof makes a building which is totally unique.
These two buildings are both similar in that they both blend in perfectly with their
environment, and are both incredible examples of Organic Architecture.
Fallingwater is the perfect addition to the streams, rocks and forests of its setting,
while the mountainous roof of the Maggie’s Centre blends so well into the hills
behind it that it seems to be part of them.
These, in my opinion, are two of the most beautiful buildings on the planet. They
show us that by listening to the environment, we can become part of it, and that we
can do good for the world around us, if only we try.