AI Workflows for Frank Lloyd Wright’s Unrealized Vision
Introduction
What if I told you this style was created by possibly the most famous architect in American history, but was subsumed by other modernist movements for the last ¾ of a century?
What if I told you that the emerging field of AI-assisted design now offers the perfect opportunity for rediscovering this style?
No these aren’t the “ticky-tacky little boxes” of suburban modernism or the wild curves of Art Nouveau. This is the Usonian style developed by Frank Lloyd Wright.
History
Origins: Organic Architecture and The Prairie Style
From open plans and textile block to solar-centric design and site-conscious organic architecture [4], his ideas are ubiquitous in modern architecture discussions and many other late 20th century styles all borrow an idea or two from Wright. Though his ideas remain popular, today designing buildings in the Usonian style he championed is not.
Frank Lloyd Wright (FLW) is best known for his large projects and prairie style, which was a design movement focused on large low-slung estates sporting low pitched hip roofs, stained glass, ribbon windows, and strong horizontality that harmonized with the flat prairie environment of Wisconsin and Illinois.
In all of FLW’s works he designed spaces like a series of overlapping Venn diagrams often radiating out in an L or pinwheel shape. Rather than separating rooms with walls and doors as was common in the late 1800s when wright began practicing architecture, his rooms would overlap at their diagonals to create multi-use, simultaneous spaces and offer occupants many perspectives of their use. Kitchens would flow seamlessly into dinettes and then into living rooms, and so on. Rather than trying to cram all these uses in a predefined massing like a postmodern design might do, Wright let the plan define the massing of the building, which he called “Organic Architecture”. Some other guiding principles in Wright’s designs include:
- Separate common spaces not with walls, but with bulky objects like built-in furniture or chimneys. These components act like screens since they don’t connect with all floors, walls, and ceilings, maintaining some privacy but making things seem connected.
- Make liberal use of corner windows to improve interior/exterior connection.
- Design buildings inspired by the surroundings landscape that appear at home in their environment.
- Avoid designing boring boxes and stop treating buildings like “machines for living” [5]. After all, Wright once said “The box is a fascist symbol and the architecture of freedom and democracy needed something besides the box.” (video below) [6] Thoughtfully breaking up massing with corner windows, dramatic wings, and equilateral triangular plans enlivens the structure.
- Use architecture to convey philosophical ideals such as freedom of movement or lack of confinement, and political notions of democracy and choice.
Development of Usonian: The Jacobs House Wager
Unfortunately, FLW’s houses usually had astronomical prices. However, in 1936, Herbert Jacobs, a journalist who admired Wright’s work but couldn’t afford it on his middle-class income, bet Wright he couldn’t design a house that only cost $5,000 in. In 2024 dollars that’s about $110,000.
Wright accepted the challenge and feverishly set about developing a stylish affordable home design in his organic architecture style. Wright later said “”The house of moderate cost is not only America’s major architectural problem, but the problem most difficult for her major architects. As for me, I would rather solve it with satisfaction to myself and Usonia, than build anything I can think of at the moment.” – FLW [7]. When Wright completed the Jacobs house, it became the first Usonian style home, of which he would design many more – all very different, but following the same affordable, organic design principles. You can learn more about the Jacobs house in the video below.
Defining Usonian
The word Usonian, derived from the abbreviation U.S., was coined to refer to the relatively young United States more as a unique culture and not just as a place or political entity [8].
While Prairie style was wright’s take on the Arts and Crafts movement (Pre-1920), Usonian was Wright’s take on modernism (Post 1936). Usonian in one sense a brand name for his later homes, but it was also Wright’s idea of what a utopian design philosophy might look like [9].
FLW Enthusiasts sum up the differences nicely with the following definitions [10]:
- “Prairie Style houses (1900-1920) were two story built on urban city lots that had ribbon windows with large overhanging hip roofs and basements. These houses were, for most part, large homes designed for people of means, many designed to be serviced by servants. Interior woodwork was mainly quarter-sawn oak including the flooring. Kitchens were not “designed” but utilitarian for use of the servants. Most of the furniture was free-standing. Dining room tables were designed specifically for the houses. Bookcases were built-in with glass doors. Windows contained stained-glass or wood muntins. Free standing garages appear in some of them. Many of the clients were entrepreneurs or high-level professional types.”
- “Usonian houses (1936-1959) were mostly one story built on exurban acreage, and were designed for the post-servant USA. Designed for middle class people who, for the most part, wouldn’t have been able to afford a Prairie Style home, but appreciated good design in a smaller package. Most Usonians had flat roofs. The large overhangs remained. The ribbon windows were still there but now there were doors incorporated will full height windows to allow easier access to the exterior enhancing the inside/outside feeling. Corner-less mitered windows are introduced. Stained-glass not used, replaced by perforated wood panels covering clerestory windows. Interior woodwork was mostly red tidewater cypress or Philippine mahogany. The basements were gone, replaced by a red-stained concrete slab for interior flooring. A lot of the furniture was built-in and the majority of the free-standing furniture was designed specifically for the house. Bult-in bookcases with glass doors were replaced by open shelving. Kitchens were part of the interior design and opened to the other rooms. Carports appear in most of them. Many of the clients were academics.”
Wright designed an astounding variety of buildings so summarizing them all can be challenging. The best way to learn more is by exploring each building in detail, which you can do with this helpful map of FLW buildings: Frank Lloyd Wright Buildings Mapped (SavingPlaces.org)
Why Use AI for Usonian Design?
Harmonizing with the Site
What makes AI the perfect tool for a revival of a Usonian design philosophy? Well, one of the core principles of Usonian architecture is harmony with the surrounding site. AI tools like Midjourney can excel at this. When an AI like Midjourney generates an image of a building in a landscape, both components both come from the same sea of jumbled pixels and are resolved by the same guiding parameters (for a more in-depth explanation of diffusion models, see Pixels to Plans Post 1 – Section 4: Unpacking AI – A Peek Behind the Pixels). The AI effectively understands all possible similarities a building and its site can have and has no issue translating the properties of that site into architectural features in subtle but elegant ways.
By feeding an AI program a photo of a building site and a brief description, you can generate images that explore how a Usonian home might integrate with that specific environment. With a little prompt engineering (See Prompt Engineering for Better Midjourney Results) Below are some examples produced with this method. They are intentionally modest (in the spirit of Usonian design) but considering these results took mere minutes to achieve this AI workflow speaks for itself.
Site: Steep plot of land with Eucalyptus in Oakland, CA
Prompt Template: highly detailed and interesting professional architecture photo of a row of densely spaced frank lloyd wright usonian style {home, tinyhome village}that blend seamlessly with the surroundings, highly detailed and interesting, in Oakland, CA, affordable housing, compelling composition and massing, inspired by a hillside and trees, verticality, color grading moody lighting –no one-story, low-profile, far away, uninteresting –iw 2 –s 300 –v 6.0 –c 10
Site: Steep plot of land with golden grass in Oakland, CA
Prompt Template: design render of a building that blends seamlessly with its surroundings, highly detailed and interesting professional architecture photo of a usonian style home in Oakland, CA, compelling composition and massing, moody dramatic skies and lighting –iw 1.5 –s 500 –v 6.0 –c 10
Prompt Template: highly detailed and interesting professional architecture photo of a usonian style home in Minnesota, surrounded by trees, dark wood, interesting compelling composition and massing, blending seamlessly into its surroundings, inspired by trees and meadows, inspired by its surrounding landscape in Blue Earth County, MN, frank lloyd wright usonian style, dark wood, tree bark, affordable home, 1 story, harmonious –s 300 –v 6.0 –c 10 –no far away, uninteresting –iw 1.5
Designing for Density: A Usonian Style for the 21st Century
We’ve discovered how to reproduce a Usonian style and how to meld it with your site using AI, but how do we expand on it for the modern era? For that I propose the following design goals:
- Prioritize Scalable Designs – Develop concepts that are scalable, accommodate density, and have a broad appeal (we have a whole housing crisis to solve after all).
- Use Human-centric Plans – Wright’s method of organic architecture was to set the room layout first based on how people experience the flow of spaces, then design the building around that. This would frequently result in a simple, but appealing L or T-shaped plan. While image generators usually struggle with technical drawings like plans (more on that in a future post) this principle can help us pick massing ideas from the AI that can accommodate these organic plans, while discarding both uninviting minimalist boxes and unconstructible overcomplicated McMansions.
- Harmonize with Nature – The concept needs to visibly have site responsive design like solar exposure and minimizing impact on its surroundings – concepts FLW frequently explored nearly 100 years ago long before the concept of sustainable design existed. In urban spaces where there isn’t as much nature left to disturb, we should still aim to reintroduce nature back to dreary urban spaces.
- Reflect the Landscape – The style needs to adapt based on its location. There is no one size fits all. To expand beyond the Prairie, we need a version that blends with the Rockies, a version that camouflages with the redwoods, a version that embraces the Mississippi, etc.
- Use Warm Inviting Materials – Draw from FLW’s material palette to evoke a warm, inviting, and earthy, yet elegant sense of harmony. Any architectural statement pieces or higher-priced materials should be limited and surrounded by otherwise repeatable and humble materials in keeping with the goals of FLW’s initial bet with Herbert Jacobs. (e.g. red tinted concrete, stucco, brick veneer, or horizontal plank siding, which are all common materials in Usonian designs)
Let’s consider bullet #1. All of Wright’s Usonians were single family detached homes in rural areas – hardly a sustainable option for the 21st century. In fact, when Wright proposed his Broadacre Plan [11] he clearly didn’t see the drawbacks of such low-density development, which we see in today’s suburban sprawl. How can we improve on this? We could consider something antithetical to his 19th century sensibilities…. Multi-family; shocking for a man who once said everyone would have an acre of land and get around by helicopter in the future [12]. So, let’s imagine what some Usonian apartments and townhomes might look like:
Reflecting America’s Landscapes
For all of his Usonian projects, Wright took inspiration from American landscapes in an effort to create something Uniquely American and divorced from existing popular styles of the early 1900s like those imported from Europe. Usonian is meant to mirror the many varied landscapes of the U.S. These range from falling water blending with the riparian PA landscape (though Fallingwater straddles the line between Prairie style and Usonian due to its size), to the house FLW’s son hovering like a mirage above the Arizona desert. While Wright designed in many different states, he never got to design a building for every landscape North America has to offer. So, in an effort to expand his vision of Usonian as a nationwide design style, let’s develop some landscape inspired concepts for a new age of Usonian design using AI.
As usual, a combination of carefully engineered text prompts and image prompts are the way to go for the most control over your results. For the photos let’s start with some representative Usonians like the Samara House, John Lloyd Wright House, Masaro House, and Pope Leighey House among others and apply them to different environments.
How about we start with a mountain inspired Usonian style since Wright never built any Usonians in the Rocky Mountain states. It could reflect the alpine environment as a reimagined chalet where the usual Usonian flat roof is tilted up much steeper to both resemble the mountains and shed snow. Alternately we could imagine it in the high desert with its cozy earth tones, or on a wooded mountainside sitting lightly on the land with piers that mimic the surrounding tree trunks.
Now let’s imagine a coastal Usonian-inspired home. Consider a house on the banks of the Mississippi that elevates its living spaces above potential flooding but steps down at its periphery to embrace life on the river and blend with the muddy waters, much like Fallingwater. Alternately, maybe we create a sharp and angular home that yearns to be a lighthouse and reflects the craggy rock faces of New England. Switching coasts, we could consider a stone and copper clad home with colors that meld with the ice plant of the Monterey Bay. Or how about a seaside Florida bungalow with a brise soleil inspired by the perforated windows of the Pope Lehigh house and many other Usonians. However, in this context that brise soleil doesn’t just keep out the hot Florida sun, it is also designed to protect the windows from debris during tropical storms.
In California, there are actually several real FLW projects in the state to use as a guide but even more biomes to work with. From the Fawcett Farm home that translated the Midwest Usonian aesthetic to the fields of the Central Valley [13], to the Clinton Walker House in Carmel by the Sea seemingly sculpted from the yellow bluffs below with patinaed copper roofing to reflect the bluish green of the surrounding ice plant and eucalyptus. There are even protégé’s of Wright who put their own spin on his style for California, such as Arthur Dyson and his more sculptural, curved take on organic architecture.
To that end, let’s imagine a Usonian for California’s rolling hills, with maybe a few organic curves to mirror the hills and the “organic” and “crunchy-granola” vibe fitting for the golden state.
In all of these cases the overall form of the building varies greatly, but deep down that subtle Usonian DNA in the design remains.
The Case for Usonian Design Today
Wright’s signature Usonian style can be found in the roughly 60 homes he designed for middle-class families starting in 1936. However, 60 is nowhere near the millions of homes that could have been built had the US to wholeheartedly embraced this style. A few of Wright’s ideas did make it into the much more ubiquitous and less elegant ranch style that sprawled across the country [14]. However, stylistically and philosophically, Usonians, Ranch homes, and the many other styles influenced by Wright are very different.
Ultimately, the US needs to build a lot of affordable homes in the coming years. The way I see it, when taking on this challenge architects have two options. 1) they can design run-of-the-mill boxes in a sanitized style unloved by the public, meeting the bare minimum of what constitutes a home…. Or 2) architects can use this opportunity to add to their community’s architectural character with simple, affordable, yet thoughtful buildings.
Usonian design, with its origins in a bet to design that $5,000 house, can teach us some important lessons on building beautiful homes affordably. Thus, architects would be wise to take much more inspiration from Usonian design, which has already proven its cost-effectiveness, livability, and cultural relevance.
Conclusion
Usonian architecture offers a compelling vision for a future where homes are affordable, beautiful, and in harmony with nature. By embracing AI tools and reimagining Usonian principles for the 21st century, we can create a new generation of homes that meet the needs of our time.
This blog post is just the beginning of our exploration of Usonian architecture. In future articles, we’ll delve deeper into specific AI tools and techniques, showcase examples of Usonian-inspired design for other contexts, and explore the challenges and opportunities of adapting Usonian design principles to modern building codes and practices.
Please subscribe using the form below to stay up to date on all Pixels to Plans posts and stay tuned for more on how Usonian design can shape the future of architecture.
About the Author
AcanthusAlchemist
Designer and engineer exploring the intersection of AI, architecture, and urbanism.
email: acanthus@pixelstoplans.com
Subscribe to Our Free Newsletter
Interested in exploring other AI generated architecture concepts and design workflows? Sign up for our free mailing list below to be notified whenever we post new content here on Pixels to Plans.
I think my dream home would be a Usonian home, we need to bring this style back.