Frank Lloyd Wright Designs for an American Landscape 1922-1932 San Marcos in the Desert Exhibitions Library of Congress

7/30/15 6:33 PMSan Marcos in the Desert - Frank Lloyd Wright: Designs for an American Landscape, 1922-1932 | Exhibitions - Library of Congress

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Frank Lloyd Wright: Designs for an American Landscape, 1922-1932San Marcos In The Desert

Home | Overview | Copyright and Ordering Information | AcknowledgmentsSections: Introduction | Gordon Strong | Lake Tahoe | Doheny Ranch | Johnson Desert Compound | San MarcosSan Marcos In The Desert, Near Chandler, Arizona, 1928-1929In 1928, beset by personal and financial difficulties, Wright again found himself with little work. Showing uncharacteristic humility, heagreed to consult with a former apprentice on the design of the Arizona Biltmore. His trip to Phoenix to accomplish that task led to amajor proposal for a similarly luxurious resort: San Marcos in the Desert. It was commissioned in early April by Alexander J.Chandler (1859-1950), one of the area's successful developers. Wright wrote to his son, "Phoenix seems to be the name for me too.. . . It looks as tho I was well started now for the last lap of my life and work." By May 1928 he had a scheme for the resort in mind.

Chandler's site of some 1,400 acres, located south of Phoenix at the base of the Salt River Mountains, offers close views to aforeground enclosed by low hills with framed views to a greater vista beyond - not unlike the sites for Doheny, for Lake Tahoe, andfor Johnson. Wright emphasized these different depth - planes in his composition, reinforcing a residential typology in whichprotective elements of the visible surroundings were balanced with open views suggestive of limitless space.

Chandler responded positively to Wright's proposal; working drawings were completed in 1929, and favorable estimates auguredwell for construction. The stock market crash in October, however, doomed the project. Grossly insensitive residential developmentnow obscures much of the site.

Map showing the proposed location of the San Marcos in the Desert resort, near Chandler, Arizona

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Map showing the proposed location of the San Marcos in the Desert resort, near Chandler, Arizona

S.F. Goddard, cartographer. Holmquist and Maddock's Map of Maricopa County, Arizona (Holmquist and Maddock, 1926).Photolithograph. Geography and Map Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (122)Bookmark this item: http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/flw/flw6.html#obj1

View of Ocatilla, near Chandler, ArizonaThis view of Ocatilla depicts Wright and his family approaching the camp by automobile.

View of Ocatilla, near Chandler, Arizona. Unknown photographer. Gelatin silver print, 1929 (negative exposed), modern print fromcopy negative. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (162)

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Exterior and interior views of Ocatilla, near Chandler, Arizona

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Exterior and interior views of Ocatilla, near Chandler, Arizona. Unknown photographer. Gelatin silver prints. 1929 (negativesexposed), modern prints from copy negatives. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.. Gift ofDonald D. Walker, 1986 (153)


Hypothetical study model for San Marcos in the DesertSurviving plans provide detailed information as to the shape and location of each component of the main resort, and historic surveysconfirm local topography. Judicious cuts would have formed a harbor-like area just behind the entrance, at the end of the roadway,and a gentle grading of slopes near the building would have provided firm anchorage.

As became apparent in constructing the model, underlying patterns of the terrain were strengthened by Wright's additions of buildingand terrace, and the site would have achieved extraordinary definition through his knowing intervention. Two related designs (for theCudney and Young houses) were not indicated in the overall plans, but their l ... More

EnlargeHypothetical study model for San Marcos in the Desert. Basswood and birch, 1995-96. Scale: 1 inch = 50 feet (area represented:approximately 1/2 mile by 1/2 mile). Second view of model. Created for the exhibition by George Ranalli, architect, with AaronMcDonald and Nathaniel Worden, model makers (121)


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Ocatilla, 1929In January 1929, Wright, fascinated by the ephemerality that the desert suggested, built a temporary camp on a low mound south ofthe site for San Marcos. There, during the months that followed, he completed working drawings for the resort.

He called the camp "Ocatilla" after the giant desert shrub he so admired, and with low board walls defined an angled enclosure apartfrom the surrounding desert. A full-scale sample of the textile blocks for the resort was constructed, demonstrating the visual effectsWright expected to achieve. Working drawings were completed by late May, when Wright left for Taliesin.

In June, much of the camp was destroyed by fire. What remained gradually fell into ruin and disappeared. Yet it demonstrated how

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Wright approached the land even when no permanent structure was contemplated: as a place that could reach higher definitionthrough understanding use.

Plan for Ocatilla

An architectural theme based on the triangle . . . the mountains . . . rising behind triangles. The cross section of theSaguaro and all other desert plants - triangles . . . the building horizontally drifted between the rock ledges thatterminate it. 1928

EnlargePlan for Ocatilla. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and colored pencil on tracing paper, 1929. The Frank Lloyd WrightFoundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (108)


Fragment of full-scale maquette for textile blocks, San Marcos in the Desert

Fragment of full-scale maquette for textile blocks, San Marcos in the Desert. Plaster, 1929. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation,Scottsdale, Arizona (142)


Textile block for San Marcos in the Desert

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Perspectives and Plans for the Hotel

Out here obvious symmetry soon wearies the eye, stultifies the imagination before it begins. So, there should be noobvious symmetry in the building in the desert. ... The hard straight line breaks to the dotted line where starknecessity ends and thus allows appropriate rhythm to enter in order to leave suggestion. 1932, 1931

The resort was to be approached along an angled roadway embedded in a dry-bed or "wash" and leading through the outer walls ofthe building itself, again recalling the Johnson compound. At San Marcos, this opening for the roadway was partly framed by thelounges and main dining room, which bridged it, joining the low hills on each side.

A powerful and richly faceted vertical element - intended to enclose organ pipes - emphasized these central rooms. Low wingscontaining private suites stretched out on each side, terracing the natural slope of the hills. The angles of the existing contours aswell as the desert setting suggested triangular shapes to Wright. The triangle became the project's ruling motif: his plan was infusedwith a rich angularity only suggested in his earlier work of the decade. By such angles the earth itself was brought into greater playwith the building forms.

With his design for San Marcos, Wright conceived a unified, massively scaled yet informally shaped landscape of building, roadway,and terrain, leaving the predictable symmetries of conventional monumentality far behind. The sharply drawn lines of the terraces,with triangular terminations carried out into the desert, mark a clear division between cultivated and uncultivated plantings. As eachascending floor steps responsively back along the slope it adjoins, the roof terraces multiply, so that an architectural composition ofconnected planes results.

Preliminary plan for San Marcos in the Desert

EnlargePreliminary plan for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and colored pencil on tracing paper, 1928. TheFrank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (116)


Preliminary plan of upper level for San Marcos in the Desert

EnlargeTextile block for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite on tracing paper, 1929. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (171)

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EnlargePreliminary plan of upper level for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and colored pencil on tracingpaper, 1928. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (117)


Front elevation for San Marcos in the DesertThis view emphasizes the low sweep of the design and clearly indicates how Wright envisioned the extended wings as terracingelements that embank the low slopes behind. Specific uses of the elements that bridge the ravine as it continues up behind theresort are unidentified.

Out here obvious symmetry soon wearies the eye, stultifies the imagination before it begins. So, there should be noobvious symmetry in the building in the desert. . . . The hard straight line breaks to the dotted line where starknecessity ends and thus allows appropriate rhythm to enter in order to leave suggestion. 1932, 1931

EnlargeFront elevation for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and colored pencil on tracing paper, 1928. TheFrank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (113)


Aerial perspective for San Marcos in the DesertThis drawing appears to have been done in preparation for the more finished perspective that follows. Its harder lines help defineindividual elements of the resort.

EnlargeAerial perspective for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and colored pencil on tracing paper, 1928.The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (143)


Perspective for San Marcos in the Desert

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Perspective for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite on tracing paper, 1928. The Frank Lloyd WrightFoundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (111)


Perspective showing entrance for San Marcos in the DesertCars were meant to approach the resort by following a ravine up to, then under, the building. The linear rendering technique gives animpression of the "dotted line" effect that Wright expected to obtain from the faceted concrete blocks.

EnlargePerspective showing entrance for San Marcos in the Desert. Graphite and colored pencil on tracing paper, 1928. The Frank LloydWright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (112)


Aerial perspective for San Marcos in the DesertThis much-published drawing - rendered by Wright's son Lloyd Wright - supplies the ambience of place and extraordinary sense ofscale that Wright had requested. At each end of the extended terraces, walls link to related components: at the right, to a buildingresembling the Chandler house, and at the left, to a building vaguely suggestive of the Young house. Other structures shown behindthe resort and bridging the ravine between the two prominent hills seem meant to suggest future development of the resort.

EnlargeAerial perspective for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Watercolor on wove paper,1928. The Frank LloydWright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (110)


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Interior Perspectives for the HotelThe major public spaces of the resort were the main dining room and lounge at the centre of the complex. The dining room at the topwas to have a richly faceted ceiling of copper and glass, recalling similar motifs in the dining room of the Imperial Hotel. The two-storey lounge was to be located below, over the automobile entrance at a lower level still. Throughout, glass and patterned concreteblocks were to be combined in ways that would have achieved the effect of a luminous mass.

Interior perspective of the dining room for San Marcos in the Desert




EnlargeInterior perspective of the dining room for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and colored pencil ontracing paper, 1928. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (115)


Interior perspective of the lounge for San Marcos in the Desert

EnlargeInterior perspective of the lounge for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and colored pencil on tracingpaper, 1928. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (114)


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Working Drawings for the HotelComplete working drawings reveal extraordinary attention to detail. Plans and sections suggest the complexities of the triangularmodule that governed the design of the central core; the extended wings of rooms on three levels are comparatively simple, yetshaped to define individual spaces. Sections show how gently the wings would have reinforced their sloping site.

Plan and sections of central section showing the dining room for San Marcos in the Desert

EnlargePlan and sections of central section showing the dining room for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite ontracing paper, 1929. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (118)


Section through the central element showing the dining room and lounge for San Marcos in the DesertThe tower rising behind the central element of the resort, richly embellished with geometric patterns, would have provided a dramaticaccent at the point of entrance to the complex. Details in the upper left show how concealed lights beneath glass blocks in the floorwould have encircled selected columns with translucent bands.




EnlargeSection through the central element showing the dining room and lounge for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright.Graphite on tracing paper, 1929. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (120)


Plan and sections of first terrace, east wing, showing guest rooms for San Marcos in the Desert

EnlargePlan and sections of first terrace, east wing, showing guest rooms for San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright.Graphite on tracing paper, 1929. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (119)


Plan for the Wellington and Ralph Cudney house, San Marcos in the Desert

EnlargePlan for the Wellington and Ralph Cudney house, San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and coloredpencil on tracing paper, ca. 1928-29. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (126)


Perspective for the Wellington and Ralph Cudney house, San Marcos in the Desert

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Young and Cudney HousesIn addition to the central resort, private houses were also to be part of the San Marcos development. Wright prepared designs fortwo: the Owen D. Young house (with some drawings inscribed "for Mrs. Owen D. Young"), and the Wellington and Ralph Cudneyhouse. Both illustrate his continued exploration of block construction adapted to a desert setting.

In its general layout, the Young house resembled the Sachse project (gallery 5), but with an oculus recalling Wright's own desertstudio (also gallery 5) added to its major room. Indicated on the drawings as a solarium, it was to be largely open at the centre. Byaligning the blocks of its walls on a diagonal grid, Wright developed unusual triangular massing, and windows identical in shape andsize to the individual blocks animated its massiveness.

In the Cudney house, Wright developed variations of hexagonal geometry; it was an intensification of shapes of the main hotel,effectively rendered to suggest a pattern of vibrating lines that appear to rise up out of the desert itself.

Plan for the Owen D. Young house, San Marcos in the Desert

EnlargePlan for the Owen D. Young house, San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and colored pencil on tracingpaper, ca. 1928-29. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (124)


Perspective for the Owen D. Young house, San Marcos in the Desert

EnlargePerspective for the Wellington and Ralph Cudney house, San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite and colored pencil on tracing paper, ca. 1928-29. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (125)

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EnlargePerspective for the Owen D. Young house, San Marcos in the Desert. Office of Frank Lloyd Wright. Graphite on tracing paper, ca.1928-29. The Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, Scottsdale, Arizona (123)


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Home | Overview | Copyright and Ordering Information | AcknowledgmentsSections: Introduction | Gordon Strong | Lake Tahoe | Doheny Ranch | Johnson Desert Compound | San Marcos











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Frank Lloyd Wright Designs for an American Landscape 1922-1932 San Marcos in the Desert Exhibitions Library of Congress