Boston Flora

Tag: Jennifer Gray

  • Thursday, September 12, 2:00 pm Eastern – Taliesin West, the Desert Laboratory, Online

    In 2023, the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation commissioned the integrated design practice at Sasaki to complete a new master plan of Taliesin West, the former home and studio of architect Frank Lloyd Wright in Scottsdale, AZ. In this conversation between Sasaki landscape architects and senior staff from the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, the history of the site will be discussed along with the impetus and aims of the project and broader lessons for everyone who cares about landscapes.

    Taliesin West embodies Wright’s principles of organic architecture blending harmoniously with the surrounding landscape. The Sonoran Desert surrounding Taliesin West is an integral component of its design and plays a crucial role in the site’s development and sustainability; it is also one of the most biologically diverse deserts in the world, home to many distinct species of flora and fauna adapted to survive in its harsh and arid conditions. The buildings and landscapes face new challenges from climate change, invasive species, and development. The new master plan by Sasaki will respect the site’s heritage while considering contemporary developments in ecology and sustainability, allowing the site to remain a resilient and alluring destination for visitors seeking horticulture and culture alike.

    Speakers include Susannah C. Drake, FASLA FAIA, a Principal at Sasaki and founder of DLANDstudio. She lectures globally about resilient urban design and has taught at leading design schools including Harvard, Cooper Union, and Illinois Institute of Technology. She received the 2020 Cooper Hewitt National Design Award for Climate Action and her work is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art. Stuart Graff began studying Frank Lloyd Wright’s work more than fifty years ago, sustaining a lifelong passion for the work of America’s greatest architect. Since 2016, as the President and CEO of the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, he has stewarded one of the world’s great cultural legacies to ensure its relevance for our time and for the future: teaching us how to build and live better, as one with the world around us. Jennifer Gray, PhD is the Director of the Taliesin Institute at the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation. She is an architectural historian and curator with a focus on modern architecture, landscape, and social politics. She serves on the Board of Directors for the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy. Andrew Sell is a Senior Associate Ecologist and Landscape Architect at Sasaki specializing in landscape restoration and ecological design for a changing climate. Before joining Sasaki in 2017, Andy practiced environmental education and ecological restoration at Glacier National Park, Matthaei Botanical Gardens & Nichols Arboretum.

    The Garden Conservancy will sponsor a webinar on September 12 at 2 pm Eastern $5 for members of the Garden Conservancy
    $15 for General Admission A recording of this webinar will be sent to all registrants a few days after the event. We encourage you to register, even if you cannot attend the live webinar.

  • Sunday, January 21, 2:00 pm – 3:30 pm Eastern – Architects Respond to Nature: Frank Lloyd Wright and the Myth of the Prairie, Online

    Although architecture itself originated from a need for shelter from nature, modern humans retain the desire to live with nature around or near them—even in urban settings. Since the development of plate glass in the 17th century and mechanized heating and cooling in the late-19th and 20th, the relationship between architecture and nature has continually evolved to the point that architecture is now including or mimicking natural processes of decay and self-replication.

    Over the course of the last century, the work of two architectural giants, Frank Lloyd Wright and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, responded to nature in very different ways through their philosophies and approaches, influencing the work of other architects as well as builders and clients. Today’s architecture draws on the legacies of these groundbreakers, especially by integrating structures with the site, incorporating natural materials, or maximizing visual access to surrounding nature and the seasons.

    Frank Lloyd Wright is often associated with a Prairie School of architecture characterized by horizontal lines and abstract geometries that purportedly harmonized with the Midwestern landscape and advanced an American style of design.

    Jennifer Gray, vice president and director of the Taliesin Institute at the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, takes a closer look at this familiar story and explores how the myth of the prairie related to broad questions about colonization, immigration, and national identity that pervaded social and architectural discourse at the turn of the 20th century. This January 21 Zoom presentation is sponsored by Smithsonian Associates in collaboration with the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Edith Farnsworth House. Designed and built between 1946 and 1951, the Edith Farnsworth House was as a weekend retreat for prominent Chicago nephrologist, musician, and poet, Dr. Edith Farnsworth, as a place to relax, entertain, and enjoy nature. It is recognized as an iconic masterpiece of the International Style of architecture and has National Historic Landmark status. The architect was Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and this was his first and most significant domestic project in America. Located 58 miles southwest of Chicago, the glass and steel house is set within a natural landscape on a 62-acre parcel located along the Fox River. Learn more here. $20 for Smithsonian Associates members, $25 for nonmembers. Two additional sessions in February and March, on Mies van der Rohe and Beyond Sustainability, may be found at this link as well.

    A view from across reflecting pool of the Avery Coonley House by Frank Lloyd Wright, 1906–09 (Avery Architectural & Fine Arts Library, Columbia University)