Crystal Bridges, Chicken Salad, and Frank Lloyd Wright

             ArkDem-Gaz story “Habitat for Humanity” features Frank Lloyd Wright’s Bachman-Wilson House on display along the Tulip Trail at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas. On our journey home from the American West, we stopped by NW Arkansas and dropped in on Crystal Bridges. We and at least 1000 other people had the same idea that beautiful fall day, including various school groups. Well-planned, nicely organized, and brilliantly accessible, Crystal Bridges is a gem. Of those 1000 guests at the museum, about half were having a quick bite to eat at 11, the Restaurant.  I hear the chicken salad is “to die for.”

One of the things I wanted to see on our visit there was the Frank Lloyd Wright house. Not open to the public until November 11, the grounds and exterior are beautiful. As visitors, we walked up to the serene design of the house’s front elevation and admired the wood design around the windows and were struck by the clean lines, along with the Wright-dubbed ‘car port.’ 

            What I loved better was the back of the house, the portion that is more wood than concrete and brick, the glassed living areas provide an open view of the slope and natural forested woodlands.

            While we did not tour the interior, the Dem-Gaz article includes a description and several photos. FLW’s living areas received the most attention with open areas similar to the so-called open-concept of modern design. The bathrooms and bedrooms, the article mentions, are minuscule, totally unrepresentative of today’s design. Austere seating arrangements are less preferable to me, but I’m sure the design is perfect for the 1950’s and the design of FLW.

            I was so pleased to see the house on site since I’d read the story of its dis-assembly and reassembly and find it fascinating that the FLW House is available to the world by being on display at Crystal Bridges.

            Have you read Loving Frank?