George W. Smith House
- Architect
- Frank Lloyd Wright
- Style
- Shingle Style
- City
- Chicago, IL
- Collection
- wright’s chicago
Designed in 1895 by Frank Lloyd Wright as one of a series of low-cost houses for engineer and inventor Charles E. Roberts, the house at 404 Home Avenue wasn't actually built until 1898, ending up occupied by Marshall Field & Company salesman George W. Smith. Cast in the Shingle style, a variation on Queen Anne that predates Wright's mature Prairie work, its most striking feature is an angled break in the roofline.
the building
Angled roofline break. The house's standout detail is a sharp angled break in its roofline, an early experiment Wright would return to a decade later when designing nearby Unity Temple.
the style
Shingle style, treated here as a variation on Queen Anne, sits at an early, transitional point in Wright's career, before his Prairie style fully took shape.
More on Shingle Stylethe architect
Wright designed the house in 1895 while still working through early ideas; the same design elements resurfaced a decade later in his Unity Temple, also in Oak Park.
More on Frank Lloyd Wrightsignificance
The house is a contributing property to the Ridgeland-Oak Park Historic District, which joined the National Register of Historic Places in December 1983.
more by Frank Lloyd Wright
nearby
- Pleasant Home
- Unity Temple
- Masonic Temple Building
- Marshall Field and Company Store
- Frank W. Thomas House
- Peter A. Beachy House