Wright Auction

Frank Lloyd Wright is the most important architect of the 20^th century. Prolific and visionary, Wright changed the American architectural landscape, defining cultural values through structure and space. He created harmonious environments, considering all details of a project from the architecture within the landscape to the furniture and decorative objects within its interior. It was this attention to detail that was coordinated from form and ornamentation all the way down to its specific placement within an interior that indicates Wright’s interest in the Arts & Crafts movement at the turn of the century.

Detail of Plate XXXVI from the Wasmuth Portfolio showing the copper urn in the interior of Browne's Book-Store, 1910.

Wright used several decorative forms repeatedly in his interior design; the copper urn was among his favorite objects and he included it in drawings and prints as early as the 1890s. In 1902, the Chicago Architectural Club included drawings and objects by Frank Lloyd Wright in an exhibition and one of his copper urns was among the items on view. Despite his appreciation for the form, the number of projects with urns was small; it is estimated that only nine were produced. Wright incorporated urns into the interiors of the Joseph Husser House, Chicago (1899); Edward C. Waller Residence, River Forest (1899); the Susan Lawrence Dana House, Springfield (1902); the Avery Coonley House, Riverside (1907); Browne’s Bookstore, Chicago (1908); Unity Temple, Oak Park (1908) as well as his own Home and Studio also in Oak Park (1889/1898).

Entryway of the Edward C. Waller House c. 1899 featuring the present lot.

The present lot is one of two urns from the Edward C. Waller House remodeled by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1899 and is among the very earliest examples of this form. One of the urns was centered on the dining table while the other was placed in the entrance hall where the circular motifs of the vessel echoed the circular shapes of the baluster in the railing of the upstairs landing. While all of Wright’s urns feature a geometric pattern with a combination of circles and squares, there were two variants of the design. There are more examples displaying an open hexagon above and below the central medallion. This example, complete with its original liner, features the rarer ‘bow tie’ motif above and below the central medallion.