a cool fucking house
 

Visited Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater this weekend - was built for a whoppin $150,000 in 1920 ... we figured that to be about $8-10 million today. Neat place though.

<IMG SRC="http://www.supdogg.com/images/fw01.jpg"><P>
<IMG SRC="http://www.supdogg.com/images/fw02.jpg"><P>
<IMG SRC="http://www.supdogg.com/images/fw03.jpg"><P>
<IMG SRC="http://www.supdogg.com/images/fw04.jpg">

Glad to see it's open again.

FLW was awesome! Here, in Florida, he designed the majority of the campus of Florida Southern and roaming around it is incredibly cool. The little details he puts into stuff is interesting. In the chapel, he ensured that tiny, colored glass blocks were formed into the bricks. When the sun comes in just right, the entire place lights up with color.

Curious statues, though. Was there any explanation for them?

Those are bird feeders. There are a few around the place, but that was my favorite. Will probably print and frame the shots I took of the statue shown.

The other cool one was this statue/bird feeder of a farmer and his son with two oxen. It was really phallic - but when I tried to sneak a shot the tour guide yelled at me (you're not allowed to take photos inside the house).

BTW - I like the photos on your site, kit. Really cool. What do you shoot with?

Thanks for the compliments, Breakingnews! It is really appreciated!

Ah, the older stuff was shot with a Minolta 450si, which was quickly replaced by a cheap Minolta X-700 which I purchased, used, for shooting on the streets after I narrowly avoided a mugging on the streets of Atlanta while out shooting. I fell in love with the X-700 and dropped the 450. The X-700 lasted until film became too expensive and I finally gave in to digital which manifested itself as a Sony F717, which is what most of the pictures on the site were shot with.

I still miss the "feel" of film. My wallet, however, does not.

Speaking of FLW, I need to dig up my images from Florida Southern. I didn't get any good photos out of it at all, but the place is amazing for architecture, which I'm a sucker for. The students that attend the school take it for granted which I think is a horrible shame.

"You go to school and live in Frank Lloyd Wright buildings! Do you know how cool that is?"

"Like, what? Frank? Who's that?"

I have an old Nikon (it's around here somewhere) that I used to take a lot of prints - it was just cool to use, so I started snapping away one summer. Eventually my parents gave me an Rebel pro which I used briefly. But then I started working at my college paper - had a D30 and a D60 at my disposal, as well as a fine array of lenses. 800mm telephoto, beautiful sigma 15mm wide-angle ... that got me really interested in photography ... until I got practical with prices. And then I just kind of lost interest. I bought myself a Sony P8 this summer for ordinary stuff, but now I wish I had fancy equipment again. :(

Goddamn, I love FLW. I've only been fortunate enough to have seen a few of his minor works (a couple of houses and a church here in KC, and a gas station in Minnesota) in person.

I would dearly love to see Fallingwater and Taleisin. What an incredible genius the man was.

The old Nikons were awesome -- you could kill a man with them by beating them over the head with it, then take a picture of the body after you were done. Tough cameras.

15mm? Whoa. That's... impressive. And a lot of glass. But what do you shoot with an 800mm? I always found long lenses tough to use unless I was sitting in the stands of an event or something.

I never really had a lot of impressive equipment, although I'd really love a digital SLR right now, even if it is just to hear a shutter fire when I push the button.

True, true and true. That Nikon is like a brick. I dropped it while climbing in New Mexico - it fell 15 feet and had no damage.

Wide angles are fucking awesome. Actually, Sony makes wide angles lenses for the F series (all their cameras, in fact). Just need a converter that goes over your lens. There's a whole kit for my P8 - I can get it for $75 on eBay (happy birthday to me ...).

800mm was fantastic for sports. That's about it really. And thong watching from a distance. But I wouldn't know about that. :)

A friend of mine got a 1D last year .. I think he's trying to sell his D60 for $1000-1100 if you're interested.

Florida Southern FLW stuff:

http://fox.org/~vince/photos/out/walkway.jpg
A copper-roofed walkway which connects buildings and protects students from unpredictable Florida rains. It is surprisingly low on headroom and anyone six foot or taller will have issues with some sections of it.

http://fox.org/~vince/photos/out/radar.jpg
The "radar" building, as I call it, because it looks like a WWII-era radar. The upper portions serve no purpose other than to look cool.

http://fox.org/~vince/photos/out/jelly.jpg
...and a mural on the art building. Yeah, I know it has nothing to do with FLW. Mmm... jelly donut filling. Keep it comin', ladies.

Neat!!!

I've been trying to figure out how to construct a house that melds the FLLW style wth an underground dwelling. One glass side would face the south, incorporating the outdoors thematically inside. Extending out/extending in. It would definitely rely on landscaping to carry it off. So far it's rough sketches and plans in my head.

I've never been to Fallingwater, although I have been to Beth Shalom, the FLW synagogue in Cheltenham, PA several times. Fascinating building. Striking from the outside, equally incredible from the inside.

He apparently designed several houses in the area as well ... I'm told that they have a lot of odd wall angles and strange floorplans.

Wright's buildings are very cool to look at but compromises in the design stage always favored beauty over practicality. they also tend to be a bear to maintain and repair.