Frank Lloyd Wright studied civil engineering at the University of Wisconsin from 1886 to -87 but never completed his final degree. After leaving the university, Wright moved to Chicago, where he worked in several architectural firms before establishing his own office in 1893.
From 1895 to 1915, Wright designed several single-family houses known as Prairie Houses, most of them complete with interiors and furnishings. In 1909, Wright traveled to Europe, where he published the monograph Ausgefürthe Bauten und Entwürfe (eng. Completed buildings and drafts) by the publishing house Wasmuth in Berlin, which led him to be more acknowledged in Europe.
Wright traveled frequently to Japan from 1913 to -22 while working on the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo. From 1923 to -24, he designed and built the Textile Block Houses, a series of Mayan art-inspired homes in California. In 1932, Wright founded the Taliesin Fellowship, a private school of architecture in Wisconsin, followed by a second branch of the school, called Taliesin West, in Arizona in 1938.
In 1935 and -36, Wright designed and built his most prominent project, the Fallingwater House for Edgar J. Kaufmann in Bear Run, Pennsylvania, and the headquarters and administration buildings of S.C. Johnson & Son Company in Racine. Wright designed several collections of furniture and furnishings for his architectural projects but also for manufacturers such as the Barrel in 1937. The Barrel Chair is a part of the Italian manufacturer Cassina's Maestri Collection, a collection of iconic furniture designed by the most prominent architects of the 20th century.
Frank Lloyd Wright’s last major architectural project was the screw-shaped Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York (1943-59). Wright passed away in 1959 at the age of 92. He is represented as a furniture designer at a.o. Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the Museum of Furniture Studies in Stockholm.
