From Library Journal
With this volume, Storrer surpasses his previous catalog of Wright's work, The Architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright (MIT Pr., 1978), by compiling detailed plans, photographs, and brief histories of every structure built by America's most widely known architect. The very handsome oversized book details the range of Wright's output from cottages in Montana to the Guggenheim Museum in New York. Although the author denies its relevance, some color photography would have enhanced the text, and the lack of a bibliography is regrettable; also, Storrer continues his earlier use of zip codes as guides to locations, a device some users will find clumsy. Nevertheless, this volume is an essential purchase for serious architecture collections.
- Daniel J. Lombardo, Jones Lib., Amherst, Mass.Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Wright expert Storrer has compiled
the definitive Wright reference book. His splendid descriptive volume covers more than 450 buildings designed by master architect Wright between 1886 and 1959. Storrer documents each structure with plans, drawings, photographs, and commentary. Each presentation is both complete and concise, following each stage of Wright's aesthetic development, each leap of his imagination, and each instance of technical innovation. The surprisingly fluid text includes anecdotes about the circumstances leading up to important commissions and pithy discussions of the personalities and motivations of Wright's often unusual clients. Storrer is not only a scholar and writer, but a computer draftsman and photographer as well. He has painstakingly redrawn floor plans to accurately reflect the layout of the actual buildings, as opposed to Wright's preconstruction drawings, and taken most of the 965 photographs. Storrer carefully composed each shot to capture the play of light and shadow Wright orchestrated for both the interior and the exterior of his unique creations. While Storrer's "companion" is not as coffee-table pretty as some of the other Wright books out this past year, it is an invaluable, enjoyable, and authoritative resource.
Donna Seaman
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