Flutterby™! : Prairie-style Lite

The recent death of architectural gadly Phillip Johnson and our discussion the other week of Frank Lloyd Wright made me notice anew a curious design motif here in the Chicago area: Prairie-Style Lite. One example is the picture shown here, the village hall in the suburb of Lincolnwood Illinois. I passed at least three such buildings in a few miles the other day. The design scheme is a low, prominent red roof, darker brick set off with some lighter stone just under the roof line, and some strongly vertical windows. The insides of such buildings are perfectly ordinary, they certainly don't subscribe to Wright's theories about decor or room flow. Some are pretty nice, like this one (its much nicer in spring), while others are rather tacky, looking like they bolted the roof on.

What's intriquing is that these formerly radical designs are now just another option in an architect's portfolio. You can order up a Wrightesque building, just like a faux Victorian with modern insulation or a bogus Spanish hacienda on the icy shores of Lake Michigan. I also note that nobody is copying the Guggenhiem or the Marin Civic center; Wright's ideas might have evolved but the popular taste prefers things he was doing nearly a century ago. Sic Transit Modernism.