Few people would make such an audacious claim as to say their house is better than Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater, but Joe Massaro has thrown that gauntlet down. It's the latest barrage in the war of words and ideas over the Chahroudi-Massaro house located on lake Mahopac in New York state. Months away from completion, this grand Wright design has been stirring up controversy since the building project was announced a few years ago. The on line Guardian Unlimited recently posted an updated story that has both Massaro and the home's current architect, Thomas A. Heinz puffing up their rhetoric against all would-be naysayers. This doesn't seem like a topic that will be going away anytime soon and it would be interesting to hear what you might think about this project (or the modern-day building of other unrealized Wright buildings.) You can read some of our other posts on the Chahroudi-Massaro house project by going here.
Photo courtesy of Thomas A. Heinz, AIA
Let's do some honest reporting on this topic. If you actually read the article you will see that it was Wright that was the first one to explicitly say to Edgar Kaufmann, in Charoudi's presence, "When I finish the house on the island, it will surpass your Fallingwater."
As the proud homeowner that he is, all that Joe Massaro was saying was that he agreed with Mr. Wright!
Posted by: Paul Ringstrom | Aug 29, 2006 at 03:52 PM
Fair is fair. While it's true that Wright should be credited as the first to make such an audacious claim, you'd expect him to say something like that in front of his client...he was trying to make the sale!
Whether or not the statement turns out to be true, we'll let you decide.
Posted by: EMO | Aug 29, 2006 at 10:15 PM
"Audacious" claim? Wright's career went on for another twenty plus years after he designed Fallingwater. To say that Wright did not believe what he was saying and that it was just a sales pitch is outrageous. Any good architect would believe that given twenty years they could "top" a previous design. If he did not truly believe that he would have meekly retired after designing Fallingwater. After all he was 70 at the time. When asked what his favorite building was he said, "the next one."
The world, seventy years after the fact, may believe that Fallingwater was his best building, but I am quite sure that he did not feel that way at the time.
Posted by: Paul Ringstrom | Aug 30, 2006 at 08:11 AM
Every claim Wright made was "audacious," that's what made him Frank Lloyd Wright. He was the P.T. Barnum of the Architecture world. He just also happened to have the genius to back-up such bold and daring words.
So, I'm sure he believed what he was saying (and selling) but it doesn't make it any less "audacious" or "outrageous" a claim. To say one design is greater than another is rather pointless anyway. All of his great designs have merit in and of themselves and need to be considered that way. To say that Fallingwater is better than the Dana House, or that Marin County Civic Center is better than Guggenheim is a fun game, but missing the point of Wright's genius in each of the structures.
The Chahroudi House will be great, I'm sure, but this one-upmanship is purely for PR's sake...Frank would be proud.
Posted by: EMO | Aug 30, 2006 at 09:49 AM
Finally, something we can agree on: " All of his great designs have merit in and of themselves and need to be considered that way."
Posted by: Paul Ringstrom | Aug 31, 2006 at 05:59 PM
What is missing in all the love/hate is the basic fact that the time of this building passed away, and that what is being created now is purely and simply a form of historical revivalism.
Given that one of the fundamental motivations of FLLW's career was the denial of such post facto rendering, the construction of the house is at best merely a curiosity like a theater set, and at worst a blatant betrayal of the root principles by which the house was originally designed. What exists on the lake is only the ghostly shadow of a past intention.
Posted by: Mark Hammons | Feb 02, 2007 at 01:53 PM