Happy natal day , Frank Lloyd Wright ! America ’s best - known architect was born 148 years ago today — though if he were still animated , he would have said he was turning 146 . ( He secernate masses that he was born in 1869 , although birth recordsindicate otherwise . ) As befits the sagacity of his erstwhile years , here are five pearls of soundness from the quintessential American intriguer .
1. “You must read the book of nature.”
In an article Wright wrote inThe New YorkTimesin 1953 , he advised an vivid discipline of the environment :
2. Get rid of your air conditioner.
Wright was all about building home that flux in with their lifelike surround . In his bookThe born House(excerptedbyThe New York Timesin 1954 ) , Wright argued that “ melodic phrase conditioning is a unsafe circumstance … I imagine it far best to gowiththe natural climate than to hear to fix a especial artificial mood of your own , " he wrote ( emphasis his ) . “ Climate means something to human . It means something in coition to one ’s life in it . Nature makes the body whippy and so the life story of the individual always becomes adapted to environment and setting . ”
3. Have a drink.
Frank Lloyd Wright ’s Fallingwater . Image course credit : Carol M. Highsmith viaWikipedia// Public Domain
question byThe New YorkTimesin the 1950s at the age of 89 , Wright explained his habit of drink a pre - dinner Irish whiskey so : “ A man is a motley fool if he drinks before he reaches the age of 50 , and a fool if he does n’t afterward . ” In the same interview , he declare that “ Coffee is food for the body ; tea , food for the judgement . ”
4. Appreciate poetry.
Willard Huntington Wright thoughtall virtuoso were poets at heart(includingarchitects ) . At the end of one of his monograph , he rail against a lack of poets in American smart set :
5. Don’t rely too much on other people’s advice.
Though Frank Lloyd Wright was a instructor who regularly advised new architects , he did n’t call back too extremely of other people ’s advice . “ Advice never bought a character worth the name , though advice is good , ” he say in hisfirst release lectureon architecture in 1900 .
