|
Iowa Sites
Douglas Grant
Mason City
Oskaloosa
Quasqueton
Read
more about our trip to Cedar Falls and FLW's Cedar Rock in Quasqueton.
|
 Located on a dead-end street and not easy
to find, the house looks to be a single-story. Like most Wright
designs though, all is not as it appears. Built on/into a hillside in 1946
and constructed from limestone quarried on the property by the original
homeowners, the house features a 127-foot-long reinforced concrete roof and
is actually three stories: the entrance and four bedrooms are on the top
floor, a staircase leads to the living room and dining room and the
kitchen is on the lower floor. An example of one of Wright's Usonian
homes, Grant home is
located on private property at the end of a dead-end street and difficult to
see from the street. We took a single photo and headed north to see our
friends in Cedar Falls.
If you are interested in learning about the Grant House,
Donna Grant Reilly recently wrote a book about her parents and their Frank
Lloyd Wright house.
"An American Proceeding: Building the Grant House With Frank Lloyd Wright , is a book about my
parents, Douglas and Jackie Grant, and their Frank Lloyd Wright house.
They belonged to an elite group of Wright clients who built their own
houses from the ground up. But, as far as I know, none of the others
left a written account of what it was like to embark upon this ambitious
project, so we will probably never know how the experience affected
their lives. Because I was present at the beginning of my parents'
adventure in 1946, and for all the years that it took to see it through
to the end, it seemed important that I try to write it down before it
faded from everyone's memory.
Doug and Jackie Grant took on a truly formidable
task when they set out to build one of Frank Lloyd Wright's finest
designs. There is no question that it changed their lives in ways they
could never have imagined at the outset, and one has to wonder if they
had any idea of what they were taking on at the time they made the
decision to do nearly everything themselves. They were remarkable people
and they accomplished a feat that most people would never have
contemplated. How many young couples would do the same today? It's a
wonderful story and I want to share it with as many people as I can."
Donna Grant Reilly
 
|
|
