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After
Monticello:
Modern
Architecture in Virginia
Architecture has come a long way since
Thomas Jefferson
first designed Monticello in the late 18th century.
More than 200 years later, in February 2006, the
Virginia Society of the American Institute of
Architects honored various projects in the
commonwealth with its latest Awards of
Excellence.
Among the honorees are a mausoleum in Salem, praised
for its meditative design; a fabric-roofed
convention center in Hampton Roads that reflects the
area’s nautical heritage; and an elementary school
in Henrico County adapted to take full advantage of
its wetlands setting.
Students of architecture often visit the
Jefferson’s neoclassical Monticello and his
Rotunda at the University of Virginia, based on the
Pantheon in Rome, but many are not aware of more
recent landmark buildings in the Old Dominion.
For example, there are three known Frank Lloyd
Wright buildings in Virginia. Wright, who lived from
1867 to 1959, is probably the most well-known
architect of the early 20th century. The Pope
Leighey House on the grounds of the Woodlawn
Plantation in Alexandria is one of the “Usonian”
houses Wright built in the 1930s for middle class
home owners. The origin of Wright’s term for these
homes is not clear. Wright attributed it to the
19th-century English writer, Samuel Butler, who
supposedly called Americans, “Usonians.” But, it
is more likely the term derives from a 1910 visit
Wright made to Europe when there was some discussion
that “U.S.A.” should be changed to “U.S.O.N.A.”
(United States of North America) to distinguish it
from the new Union of South Africa.
Usonian homes were L-shaped, single-story dwellings.
They had flat roofs and were built with natural
materials. Wright emphasized architectural features
such as overhangs that would increase passive solar
heating and cooling, natural lighting and radiant
floor heating. In some ways, he was the father of
today’s “green” building movement. Such homes
usually did not have garages and Wright is credited
with coining the term “carport” for the
protective overhangs he designed for
automobiles.
Another Wright structure, the Luis Marden House on
the banks of the Potomac in McLean was featured in a
Washington Post article in 2005. "The Wright
Way," August 21, 2005. The article chronicles
the tribulations of a developer who quietly bought
the house in 2000. He soon discovered that restoring
a landmark building designed by an American icon was
fraught with complications.
The third Wright
home in Virginia, the Andrew B. and Maude Cooke
House, is located in Virginia Beach. It’s listed
for sale at $2.5 million on the Wright on the Market
Web page maintained by The Frank Lloyd Wright
Building Conservancy. The Conservancy was founded in
1989 to save some 500 realized Wright homes. By that
time, nearly 20 percent of the Wright-designed homes
actually built had been destroyed by fire, neglect
or development.
But, it is not only private homes
that are considered architectural landmarks.
Greatbuildings.com lists the Pentagon and Dulles
Airport as 20th-century examples of distinctive
architecture in the Old Dominion. The Pentagon was
designed by architect G. Edwin Bergstrom. Its
five-sided design was meant to accommodate a site
near Arlington National Cemetery. When the site was
moved because of fears the building would block the
view of Washington, the original design remained.
The legend is that Bergstrom had to come up with
basic plans and architectural drawings for a
building that would accommodate 40,000 people in
five days in August 1941. A House of Representatives
Appropriations Subcommittee had told two brigadier
generals they needed to come up with a solution to
the temporary housing for military personnel along
the Mall. The five-sided design, while not
considered aesthetically distinctive, supposedly was
the most efficient use of space for such a large
building.
Dulles Airport was designed by prominent
architect Eero Saarinen, best known for the St.
Louis Gateway Arch. The challenges for the
Finnish-born Saarinen in designing Dulles were its
location on a 10,000-acre flat plain, as well as the
need to make it a modern gateway to the nation’s
capital. His ultimate design, a suspended structure
that was high in the front, lower in the middle and
slightly higher at the back was meant to suggest
wings and flight. The terminal building was given a
First Honor Award by the American Institute of
Architects in 1966.
Forty years later, architectural
innovation continues to thrive in the commonwealth.
During the recent Virginia Architecture Week
festivities, held from April 1 –9, one event
featured the work of W.G. Clark, a professor of
architecture at the University of Virginia. He has
been listed twice in Time magazine as one of
America’s best designers, and three of his designs
have won National Design Awards from the American
Institute of Architects.
Another event featured
tours of the Solar Decathalon house designed and
constructed by students at Virginia Tech’s School
of Architecture and Design in Blacksburg. The Solar
Decathlon was an international competition among
students of architecture to design, build and
operate a solar-powered house. Virginia Tech was
among the top five university winners. Frank Lloyd
Wright’s legacy seems to live on in Virginia.
After all, it’s not that great a leap from his
energy-efficient “Usonian” homes in the 1930s to
a solar-powered home in the 21st-century.
NEXT: “I’ve Got Bingo!”
-- Charitable
Gaming in Virginia
--
April 17, 2006
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