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How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

newyorker.com

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Re: How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

#31

Post by rayiner »

silverbax88 wrote: post #19
vanderZwan wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the point: bad city planning forces you to use a car. Compare that to a city like Groningen: https://vimeo.com/76207227

Groningen, a city of less than 200,000, is not scalable for the biggest cities in the world, which is the problem. Biking across New York or L.A. is not even remotely feasible. I'm not saying better cities are not possible, but just putting everyone on bikes is not even close to a solution. You'd be better off going back to horses.

No, but getting across NYC on the subway is probably the fastest way to do it.

Re: How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

#32

Post by zb »

mynegation wrote: post #9

I recommend everyone to visit his masterpiece building: Fallingwater tucked in the Pennsylvania countryside, and also a nearby smaller house Kentuck Knob. I visited both twice. During my second visit I stood breathless before the Fallingwater and weeped, so beautiful and perfect it was.

Seconded. I wrote up a little piece about my visit to Fallingwater and why it particularly fascinates me, as a software engineer:

http://www.zerobanana.com/essays/fallingwater/

(Kentucky Knob is also really interesting, and so close that it's certainly worth visiting both if you're in the area.)

Re: How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

#33

Post by denom »

silverbax88 wrote: post #19
vanderZwan wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the point: bad city planning forces you to use a car. Compare that to a city like Groningen: https://vimeo.com/76207227

Groningen, a city of less than 200,000, is not scalable for the biggest cities in the world, which is the problem. Biking across New York or L.A. is not even remotely feasible. I'm not saying better cities are not possible, but just putting everyone on bikes is not even close to a solution. You'd be better off going back to horses.

Just as an arbitrary data point, I've biked from Hollywood to Santa Monica. It's doable, and with a fraction of the effort spent on building and maintaining infrastructure for cars the bike-ride might even be pleasant. Re: New york, I have not biked there, but the new bike rental program seems to indicate that biking there is becoming more friendly.

Re: How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

#34

Post by jeremymcanally »

As mentioned in the article, there's an exhibit right now at NYC's MoMA on Wright's ideas about the city: http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/exhibitions/1448

I saw it last week, and it's really great. They have the scale model he built there along with a lot of his drawings. A lot of fascinating ideas in there. I just wish I could locate some of his writings on the subject without dropping $200-$300 on an out of print copy of a portion of his autobiography or papers. :(

Re: How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

#36

Post by mhurron »

snail22 wrote: post #27
josephlord wrote: post #12

I've heard the name lots of times in a Simon & Garfunkel song but I didn't know who he was.

As someone who studied architecture for years, this made me literally groan out loud. Frank Lloyd Wright is usually the one architect whom people at least have heard of. One of the issues which has discouraged me from pursuing computer programming in the past is my impression that a lot of people involved in technology-related careers (ie my would-be future peers) have narrow perspectives on the world due to their re…

> Frank Lloyd Wright is usually the one architect whom people at least have heard of.

Simpsons did it.

On a more serious note -

> people involved in technology-related careers (ie my would-be future peers) have narrow perspectives on the world due to their reduced levels of interest in a wider liberal arts education

Not any more or less than any other field. It's funny, people are individuals, they often act individually.

Re: How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

#37

Post by rglover »

I grew up in suburban Ohio and have lived in Chicago for the past two years. Before I moved, there was a longing to join the energy of the city. Ohio, by and large, is pretty slow moving. It wasn't until I got to Chicago that I realized the effect that change of pace had.

In order to both live and function in the city, I had to rewire my brain. I recall the first few months in the city being absolutely terrifying. Not because of any one thing in particular, but your sense of self starts to evaporate. You start to see the boundaries between you and the universe. You feel small.

Occasionally, my girlfriend and I travel back to her home town. An honest to goodness town, too. It's classified as a "village." When I'm there, I often take walks around the entirety of the town. The change of pace is incredible. Even compared to where I grew up, there's a sense of serenity, not just in the immediate experience, but in the people.

The behavior you see there is a total 180 from what you experience in the city – a cold, dismissive brood that makes you feel entirely too insignificant.

When I moved to Chicago I made it a point to visit FLW's home and studio in Oak Park (about 20-30 minutes outside of the city). Though the area he built in has changed dramatically (based on the descriptions told as a part of the tour), there was something really serene about it all. His home was directly adjacent to his studio. Seeing this, the whole time I thought "yeah, I could dig this."

This article makes his vision sound akin to the modern day suburb, which, while there are similarities, doesn't feel like an accurate interpretation. If you get the chance to experience some of his more rural-based work, I would check it out. There's a certain flow to the buildings he designed that elicits a feeling of peace. I can imagine his plans outlined in this article were to accomplish that on a much bigger scale.

Re: How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

#38

Post by vanderZwan »

silverbax88 wrote: post #19
vanderZwan wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the point: bad city planning forces you to use a car. Compare that to a city like Groningen: https://vimeo.com/76207227

Groningen, a city of less than 200,000, is not scalable for the biggest cities in the world, which is the problem. Biking across New York or L.A. is not even remotely feasible. I'm not saying better cities are not possible, but just putting everyone on bikes is not even close to a solution. You'd be better off going back to horses.

I agree that the solutions for Groningen do not scale on their own, but as others suggested a good public transportation system would go a long way.

I really don't see how horses would be better than bikes though.

Re: How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

#39

Post by kcovia »

rglover wrote: post #37

I grew up in suburban Ohio and have lived in Chicago for the past two years. Before I moved, there was a longing to join the energy of the city. Ohio, by and large, is pretty slow moving. It wasn't until I got to Chicago that I realized the effect that change of pace had. In order to both live and function in the city, I had to rewire my brain. I recall the first few months in the city being absolutely terrifying. No…

I think your experience describes your feelings in the city. As someone who grew up half in a city and half in the country, I feel more at home and more significant in an urban environment.

Re: How Frank Lloyd Wright Tried to Solve the City

#40

Post by snail22 »

sanoli wrote: post #30
snail22 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who studied architecture for years, this made me literally groan out loud. Frank Lloyd Wright is usually the one architect whom people at least have heard of. One of the issues which has discouraged me from pursuing computer programming in the past is my impression that a lot of people involved in technology-related careers (ie my would-be future peers) have narrow perspectives on the world due to their re…

What are you talking about? Here in HN people are aware of and interested in a bunch of different subjects. Plus, unlike the liberal arts/artist crowd, they have tachnical knowledge and are usually more rational about their opinions and conclusions. So one person says he hadn't heard of Wright in the middle of many more people commenting the article, and you say hackers need to look more at the arts?

I'm not necessarily talking about HN, but about people I have known in person - classmates in college, people I knew socially afterwards, and (this probably has skewed my judgement somewhat) an ex-boyfriend. I also personally suspect that the phenomena may even be making some hard-to-trace contribution (through reduced opportunities to practice communication skills, limited peer groups, and less time spent studying human diversity and other cultures in general) to the headlines which keep popping up about how sexist the technology field is. I know that concern may sound extreme, and I really hope that it can be proven wrong. Obviously (and thankfully) none of that can be generalized, but the original poster's example was so shocking to me that I felt compelled to say something warning people that the situation is in some cases possible.

I also don't know what you mean when you say that people with technical knowledge (which I have some of) are "more rational about their opinions and conclusions" - I sincerely believe that taking a literary theory class and learning about often-vilified (perhaps not here) ideas such as postmodernism and deconstruction improved my decision-making ability by allowing me to better understand both sides of an issue.

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