Designed in the Usonian Automatic style Frank Lloyd Wright is one of America?s most prolific and renowned architects, best known for jaw-dropping buildings like Fallingwater, Taliesin West, the Hollyhock House. But hundreds of lesser-known homes are still standing, and sometimes, they come up for sale.
Take this four-bedroom, two-bath home?called the Theodore and Bette Pappas House?in the suburbs of St. Louis, Missouri. Wright designed the house for Ted and Bette Pappas, the original and only owners, in the Usonian Automatic style. Usonians were Wright?s solution to more economical homes, built with no attics and basements and with less ornamentation than some of his other designs.
Usonian Automatics took this idea one step further. Wright created a concrete masonry building system so that materials could be manufactured and sent to the owners in a kit for self-construction. Using different types of inexpensive concrete blocks, the homes proved more challenging to assemble than anticipated, and it?s estimated that only 10 or 20 Usonian Automatic houses were built. After several years of design, construction began on the Pappas home in 1960. While craftsman made the terra-cotta-tinted concrete blocks and a contractor oversaw the project, the Pappas couple did much of the work themselves. That wasn?t enough to keep the home on budget, however. When the family moved to the home in 1964, final costs were four times the original estimates.
Still, the family home impress...