Andirons for the Adam Mayer residence, Milwaukee, Wis., designed by George Niedecken, 1904-07. Cast brass. From the collection of the Milwaukee Art Museum.

 

Designing in the Wright Style

Furniture and Interiors by Frank Lloyd Wright and George Mann Niedecken

LEXINGTON, MASS. - Frank Lloyd Wright is the best known of all American architects, but his integrated designs for home furnishings were not the product of his vision alone. From the turn of the century through World War I, he collaborated with George Mann Niedecken, a Milwaukee painter and interior designer. The Museum of Our National Heritage is surveying the work produced by these two artists in "Designing in the Wright Style: Furniture and Interiors by Frank Lloyd Wright and George Mann Niedecken," on view through September 6.

"Designing in the Wright Style," curated by Cheryl Robertson, director of exhibitions and public programs at the museum, addresses the design collaborations between Wright and Niedecken in the years 1904 to 1918, Wright's celebrated "Prairie Style" years. Their kinship grew from their mutual commitment to simplicity, honest materials and decoration derived from nature.

The exhibition examines several independent commissions by each designer. It also looks at their respective contributions to five Wright homes inspired by the Midwestern prairies, including the famed Avery Coonley and Frederick Robie residences built from 1907-10 in the Chicago area. Furnishings from the three houses for Meyer May, Edward Irving and Frederick Bogk have seldom been exhibited, never before in New England.

More than 175 drawings and examples of custom-made furniture, stained glass, carpets and decorative arts, as well as delicate watercolors, period photos and vintage books showing the interiors are on display. The exhibition is drawn largely from the extensive Prairie Archives of the Milwaukee Art Museum, with loans from the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio, the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, and other public and private collections also on view. Examples of several key objects in the exhibition are a copy of The House Beautiful, a book illustrated by Wright and hand-printed in 1896-97 in a limited edition of 90; a Wright barrel chair, circa 1900; a combination library table-desk-bookcase-couch of Niedecken's design, made for the Irving residence in 1911; and a Bogk carpet Wright designed and Niedecken had manufactured in 1917, a great rarity because very few of the architect's Prairie-style rug schemes were ever realized.

Since 1981 when Robertson mounted the retrospective "The Domestic Scene (1897-1927): George M. Niedecken, Interior Architect" at the Milwaukee Art Museum, Niedecken has become recognized as a significant Prairie School designer. He was working intermittently in Wright's studio by 1904, when he painted and signed the landscape mural encircling the dining room of the Dana House in Springfield, Ill. A watercolor study of that extraordinary sumac-and-wildflower mural is displayed in the exhibition, along with a unique Niedecken mural on canvas featuring a related sumac-and-birch design.

By 1907, when Niedecken established an independent interior decoration firm, his part in the furnishing of holistic Wright interiors was expanding rapidly. Besides designing and painting a fern-and-birch mural for the Coonley living room, Niedecken was entrusted with the fabrication and installation of custom carpets, embroidered textiles and upholstered furniture. Coonley rug designs by Wright and Niedecken will be on view along with an original color chart of still vibrant yarn samples. The exhibition includes bedroom as well as living room furniture for the Coonley, Robie and May residences.

One section of the exhibition is devoted to Niedecken's independent interior designs, which show influence of his education in Europe. He was a student of the Art Nouveau poster artist Alphonse Mucha and also studied the avant-garde decorative designs of the Secession artists in Germany and Austria. A spectacular suite of curly birch reception-room furniture designed by Niedecken in 1904-7 is featured in the exhibition.

In conjunction with the exhibition, curator Cheryl Robertson has written a catalogue about the relationship between Wright and Niedecken and the furnishings they provided for the five houses highlighted in the exhibition. Frank Lloyd Wright and George Mann Niedecken: Prairie School Collaborators is available for $18.95 in the museum's Heritage Shop and by mail (add $3.50 for shipping).

The Museum of Our National Heritage is presenting exhibitions on a wide variety of topics in American history and popular culture. The Museum is supported by the Scottish Rite Freemasons in the Northern Masonic Jurisdiction of the United States.

The Museum of Our National Heritage is at 33 Marrett Road in Lexington at the corner of Route 2A and Massachusetts Avenue. Hours are Monday through Saturday from 10 am-5 pm, and Sunday, noon-5 pm. Admission is free. Telephone 781/861-6559.