Welcome to Origin Story, a collection that chronicles the lesser-known histories of designs which have formed how we dwell.
Though Frank Lloyd Wright is arguably America’s most well-known architect, what typically goes unmentioned in narratives about his affect is the affect of a girl named Marion Mahony on a lot of his earliest work. Mahony was one of many first licensed feminine architects within the United States and Wright’s first worker. Her designs and renderings helped create the Prairie School type, which propelled Wright’s profession into the worldwide highlight. Though she was underrecognized throughout her lifetime, a more in-depth have a look at Mahony’s profession and beginning position as FLW’s design collaborator reveals an architectural pressure to be reckoned with.
Marion Mahony turned the primary lady in Illinois to safe her structure license in 1898. She’s thought-about one of many first licensed feminine architects within the United States—and the world.
Early Blueprints
Born in Chicago in 1871, months earlier than the Great Chicago Fire, Marion Mahony spent a lot of her childhood witnessing the town’s reinvention by way of improvement. Raised largely by her mom, aunt, and grandmother (her mom was a outstanding faculty principal who socialized with suffragists), Mahony pursued structure although, on the time, girls have been virtually fully excluded from the career. In 1894, Mahony turned the second lady to obtain an structure diploma from MIT and returned to Chicago to work as a draftsperson for her cousin, architect Dwight H. Perkins. The subsequent 12 months, after they have been launched by Perkins, Wright employed Mahony at his burgeoning follow, which ultimately turned his Oak Park, Illinois, studio. The determination was groundbreaking for the period, although the pair had a lot in frequent—each have been Unitarians and discovered inspiration within the work of architect Louis Sullivan. In 1898, Mahony turned the primary lady in Illinois to safe her structure license.
Frank Lloyd Wright employed Mahony within the mid-Nineties as he was establishing his burgeoning follow, which ultimately turned his Oak Park, Illinois, studio (pictured above left).
Mahony drafted plans and skillful renderings for a lot of of Wright’s early-1900s tasks, together with the Unity Temple in Oak Park—one in all his most celebrated buildings.
A Fruitful Pairing
Wright entrusted Mahony with drafting plans for buildings, furnishings, and landscapes, primarily relating to her as his chief designer. Mahony’s skillful renderings for early-1900s tasks just like the DeRhodes House in Indiana and Oak Park’s Unity Temple—one in all Wright’s most celebrated buildings—have been a key a part of establishing the Prairie School motion. She additionally produced a lot of the paintings for Wright’s 1910 Wasmuth Portfolioa lavish publication that launched his designs to Europe and cemented his international fame. Mahony’s title was left off lots of her distinctive, Japanese-influenced drawings, since that honor normally went solely to the lead architect (although she did conceal her monogram among the many foliage in her DeRhodes House rendering), however historians right this moment acknowledge her as a big contributor to Wright’s aesthetic.
Mahony married architect Walter Burley Griffin in 1911 and the 2 began their very own follow. The following 12 months, they gained a world competitors to design the brand new Australian capital, Canberra.
Griffin and Mahony, now Mahony Griffin, (pictured above left) relocated to Australia and labored on numerous tasks there into the Twenties and ’30s. The pair additionally designed a number of tasks in India, together with a never-realized constructing for the raja of Mahmudabad (above proper).
Around the World
Mahony’s collaborative relationship with the risky Wright ultimately souredand in 1911, Mahony married architect Walter Burley Griffin, they usually began their very own follow. About a 12 months in, the couple entered a contest to design Australia’s new capital. Their design gainedthey usually moved to Australia, the place Mahony (now Mahony Griffin) performed a central position in executing tasks that blended concepts about city planning with expressive architectural varieties and reverence for pure landscapes. In the Nineteen Thirties, the pair designed a number of tasks in India (together with an unbuilt library and museum for the raja of Mahmudabad) that mirrored Prairie School beliefs. While Mahony Griffin nonetheless confronted the period’s excessive sexism, her husband was supportive, telling a reporter that he was the businessman to her genius.
Mahony Griffin’s unpublished memoir, The Magic of America, has turn out to be an important supply for historians in reevaluating her key position in Wright’s profession and the Prairie School motion.
Reflection and Reevaluation
By the Nineteen Forties, after her husband’s dying, Mahony Griffin returned to Chicago and wrote The Magic of Americaa 1,400-page memoir that chronicles her philosophy, work, and strained relationship with Wright. The unpublished manuscript has turn out to be an important supply for historians wanting to reevaluate her essential position in Wright’s profession and the event and enlargement of the Prairie School. Renowned Twentieth-century architectural critic Reyner Banham as soon as reportedly described her as each the “best architectural delineator of her era” and “America’s (and maybe the world’s) first lady architect who wanted no apology in a world of males.”
Top photograph of Marion Mahony Griffin in entrance of Newman College, Melbourne University, in 1916, courtesy National Library of Australia.