#edith farnsworth

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[thefeawl]

41°38′5.96″N 88°32′8.6″W

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Mid-Century Modern Christmas Farnsworth House, 1951 Designed by Mies van der Rohe Photograph by J.C. Buck crédit: Wright Auction

[herbaminor]

Maggie Gyllenhaal & Ralph Fiennes Team Up To Tell True Story Of Farnsworth House

Maggie Gyllenhaal and Ralph Fiennes are to star in the true story of Farnsworth House. The Kindergarten Teacher and Crazy Heart star is teaming up with The White Crow and Spectre actor in the featu…

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The Farnsworth House

Working on the latest Ace Hotel, the Farnsworth House was one of Commune’s big inspiration, connecting hotel design to modernist architecture in Chicago, including the one of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.

Built between 1945 and 1951 for Dr. Edith Farnsworth, a prominent nephrologist from Chicago, this glass pavilion seems to float in the air and merge into its surroundings - the green scenery of Plano, Illinois, above the Fox River to the South.

Supported by eight steel columns, the single-story house with floor-to-ceiling windows opens up to the woods around it. The interior is one large room filled with freestanding elements that provide subtle differentiations within the open space - zones for sleeping, cooking, dressing, eating, and sitting. The space is flowing around a wood block called “core” containing private and mechanical areas such as toilet, kitchen, and fireplace.

Aside from walls in the center of the house enclosing bathrooms, the floor plan is completely open in a true minimalist way. The man-made geometric form creates a relationship with the extraneous landscape surrounding it to exemplify "dwelling" in its simplest state.

As Mies stated on his achievement, "If you view nature through the glass walls of the Farnsworth House, it gains a more profound significance than if viewed from the outside. That way more is said about nature - it becomes part of a larger whole."*

* After a legal dispute over the construction, Edith Farnsworth seemed not to share the same point of view “ The truth is that in this house with its four walls of glass I feel like a prowling animal, always on the alert. I am always restless. Even in the evening. [...] What else? I don’t keep a garbage can under my sink. Because you can see the whole ‘kitchen’ from the road on the way in here and the can would spoil the appearance of the whole house. So I hide it in the closet farther down from the sink. Mies talks about his ‘free space’: but his space is very fixed. Any arrangement of furniture becomes a major problem, because the house is transparent, like an X-ray.” However, it seems Farnsworth’s negative view of the house was fueled not only by its supposed ideological flaws, but also by heartbreak ; she had an ambiguous and tumultuous romance with Mies, a modernist love affair soon to be adapted to the big screen.

[thefeawl]

Edith Farnsworth and Beth Dunlap outside the former’s house in 1951

[thefeawl]

Farnsworth House

Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was retained by Farnsworth to design a weekend retreat during a dinner party in 1945. The wealthy client wanted to build a very special work of modern architecture, however, toward the end of construction, a dispute arose between architect and client that interfered with completion of the building.

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