The last 3-weeks in Wisconsin will include exploration of the “driftless” region of the state, including numerous significant Wright sites in Wisconsin. This dramatic landscape fundamentally informed Wright’s work, including his theories on Organic Architecture and his early Chicago-based projects through which he defined his quest to establish a uniquely American architecture. While in Wisconsin, students will work from the historic Wyoming Valley School, which was built by Wright in 1956. The school will serve as home base for a series of excursions throughout the region organized around visits, tours and events focused on Wright’s work. Students will engage local community and culture through special events and dinners.

Students will participate in a series of short design and documentation exercises themed around Wright’s work, observing relationships between individual and collective spaces, architecture and landscape, and urban and suburban form. These exercises will explore these relationships through the lenses of scale and organization, program, materials, and environment, all of which inform the role of architecture within culture and society. Exercises will be complemented by readings of Wright’s works and thought.

Throughout the Summer Immersion Program special events will include architectural firm tours, tours of privately-owned and rarely accessible Wright homes, and a series of dinners and social events hosted by the homeowners themselves.

Southern Wisconsin and Chicago are home to an expansive collection of buildings by Frank Lloyd Wright. His important institutional
buildings in the area include Unity Temple in Oak Park, Taliesin in Spring Green, and the Johnson Wax Headquarters in Racine, Wisconsin. Study tours of Wright’s works and other significant buildings will structure much of the program’s activities.