March, 1912 
Floor plan of the house at Wilmette, Illinois 
any discussion of the distinct innovations that have come to 
mark our American domestic architecture, particularly in the 
Middle West. Probably the most satisfactory examples 
of “‘Western Architecture,” as applied to the dwelling are 
to be found in the attractive suburbs that spread out fan- 
like from Chicago’s city limits, sweeping in a semi-circle 
from the shores of Lake Michigan on the north to the 
shores of this lake on the south. Perhaps local conditions 
have had much to do in developing the type of house we are 
describing herein. The region north of Chicago from the 
village of Edgewater and Sheridan Park to Lake Forest and 
Lake Bluff, through which the famous Sheridan Road winds 
and turns, is marked by many little plains and again by 
deep valleys and picturesque ravines. Indeed, this tract of 
land and the region of the lake shore, extending as it 
does almost to the suburbs of the city of Milwaukee, offers 
an aspect that makes this ‘““‘Western Architecture” particu- 
larly well adapted to the locality which has brought it forth, 
there being in perfect harmony as it is with its surroundings, 
though one doubts if a house such as is here pictured would 
fit into the landscape of Long Island, New York, the New- 
tons in Massachusetts, or into the landscape of the environs 
of Philadelphia as successfully as it does into that of the 
countryside of Wilmette. ° 
Perhaps no one of Chicago’s suburbs is more typical 
than that of Wilmette. It is both beautiful and interesting. 
Here one finds the first hill-land north of Chicago and the 
village lies directly upon the shore of Lake Michigan amidst 
a dense growth of forest trees. Its homes are, for the 
main part, ones of moderate cost (several of which, one 
may mention here, have been described in previous numbers 
of AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS). The architects of 
these houses have known well how to take advantage of the 
opportunities offered by the character of the country in the 
matter of building sites which lent impulse in the direction 
of individuality. 
The house illustrated in this article, designed for its owner 
by Frank Lloyd Wright, architect, Chicago, is one of the 
most beautiful and well-planned in this village of distinctive 
homes. It occupies a flat site in a lovely grove of trees. 
Like another Western home, described elsewhere in this 
number of AMERICAN HoMEs AND GARDENS, the present 
house fits into its arboreal accompaniment in a delightfully 
pleasing manner, emphasizing the good sense and excellent 
taste of both owner and architect in planning the house 
to fit its site instead of working over the site to make it fit 
the house, as necessity too often commands, with the result 
that artificiality is then apt to become permanent unless rare 
judgment in adjustment enters into the solution of the 
problem, as it has so successfully in this particular instance. 
AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 87 
The level spot in the grove of well-grown 
trees suggested the location of the present 
house, and made it possible to carry out 
its plan which called for a broad, low, 
roomy dwelling somewhat of the bungalow 
type, but strongly “tinged” with the same 
note that dominates the external appear- 
ance of certain bits of Japanese feudal 
architecture. Its strong individuality neither 
mars other houses in its vicinity, nor does 
it lose from any undue proximity to them. 
Instead, the grounds surrounding the house 
are ample and there is no feeling that the 
house overtops the area at the architect’s 
command for its proper setting. There 
has been plenty of room for it and it has 
not needed to take up all its room. 
The first glimpse of this suburban home 
reveals a stucco house one story high, to 
all appearances, though it has actually two 
stories. Few houses have employed stucco more attrac- 
tively than this one, if, indeed, any have, utilizing, as it 
has, broad expanses of wall space uninterrupted, for the 
most part, by any great number of very low-set windows. 
As will be seen from examining the illustrations, the fenes- 
tration has proved most successful though most unusual 
in its plan. In fact, this constitutes the most striking 
constructive note in the entire design of the house, and em- 
phasizes the effect of the broad planes upon which the house 
is modeled. ‘There is, too, a fine restraint shown in the 
construction of the roof surfaces, a pleasing angle having 
been given them from every point of view, special account 
having been taken of the projection of the eaves, which afford 
unusually deep soffts that shelter, to some extent, the win- 
dows which they cover and heighten the effect of the play 
COL 
of leaded glass, are 
The long casement windows, with their panes 
shaded by the projecting broad soffits of the roof 
