Frank Lloyd Wright

Society of Architectural Historians Plots a Future for the Charnley-Persky House

February 22, 2016 in Architecture Preservation

When a blocked sewer caused major water damage to the 1891-1892 Louis Sullivan- and Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Charnley-Persky House in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood in August 2014, the Society of Architectural Historians (SAH), which has owned the building since 1995, was quick to repair the damage. But the extent of the damage and abruptness of the repair left the SAH thinking that it needed to do something more to preserve the national historic landmark.

Fixing Frank: Unity Temple gets a sorely needed $23 million restoration

July 30, 2015

The Rev. Emily Gage chose not to take what happened shortly after she started at Frank Lloyd Wright's Unity Temple as an omen. “Right after I began, in the fall of '08, a giant piece of ceiling fell down right above the pulpit,” she said.

This compromise of the building's integrity did not happen during a Sunday service. No one was hurt. And life with Unity Temple, Wright's modernist masterpiece in Oak Park and a mixed blessing of a structure if ever there were one, went on.