Tour Frank Lloyd Wright-designed homes not normally open to the public during the 2020 Wright Plus Housewalk

For one day only this summer, a handful of private Chicago-area Frank Lloyd Wright-designed homes will be open to the public for tours.  

On June 27, the Frank Lloyd Wright Trust will host the 47th annual Wright Plus Housewalk, a day of tours in eight private residences and two public buildings in the Chicago suburbs of River Forest and Oak Park.  

The area is home to more Frank Lloyd Wright designs than anywhere in the world, including the architect’s home and studio and the Unity Temple, which was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2019. Both are open for tours throughout the year, including during Wright Plus. 

But the eight private residences — three designed by Wright and five by his contemporaries — are only open to the public during the event.  

While some homes are regulars on the tour, there are two newcomers that have never been part of the walk before.  

“We’re always featuring houses that have never been on the walk before, or houses that haven’t been on in several years,” said Christina Ruscitti, director of tour operations and guest experience for the Frank Lloyd Wright Trust, the Chicago-based nonprofit that hosts the tour. The Trust is separate from the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation, which owns Wisconsin’s most famous Wright site, Taliesin. 

Proceeds from the Wright Plus tour go toward preservation and restoration of Chicago-area Wright sites, Ruscitti said. 

One house that is new to the tour this year is the John A. Klesert House, which was designed by onetime Wright draftsman William Drummond in 1915 (Drummond left Wright’s practice in 1909). The house features Wright’s signature Prairie-style architecture, with horizontal lines and large windows that meld outside and in. 

Another newcomer is the FH Bell House, which was designed by another Wright student, Harry Mahler, in 1913. It was Mahler’s only Prairie-style residence design and still has its original leaded glass windows.  

Also part of this year’s tour is the J. Kibben Ingalls House, which was designed by Wright in 1909. The house hasn’t been part of the tour since 1999.

Another Wright-designed home on the tour is the 1908 Isabel Roberts House, which was remodeled in 1955 — the only Prairie-style interior that Wright updated himself. That included converting two bedrooms in the back of the house into a large master bedroom and enclosing the first-floor porch.  

Another house on the tour is the Henry Einfeldt House, which was designed by William Gray Purcell and George Grant Elmslie in 1914 and hasn’t been on the tour since 1982. The home has its original leaded glass, fireplace, trim and woodwork.  

Wright in Wisconsin and Oak Park 

While Oak Park might be home to the most Wright buildings in the world, Wisconsin was home to Wright.  

Born in 1867 in Richland Center, outside Spring Green, Wright spent his teenage and college years around Madison.  

He left the University of Wisconsin before completing his degree and worked as a draftsman for Joseph Lyman Silsbee, an architectural firm in Chicago, then as an apprentice at Chicago’s Adler & Sullivan.  

After Wright married his first wife, Catherine Lee "Kitty" Tobin, in 1889, his boss gave him a $6,000 loan to build a home in Oak Park — where Wright would design houses on the side in his spare time.

In 1903, a decade after Wright had left Adler & Sullivan and struck out on his own, he was designing a house for Edwin Cheney, an Oak Park neighbor, and fell for the man’s wife, Mamah. 

The two had an affair that led to Wright abandoning his wife and children and in 1911 building a new home and studio, Taliesin, in Spring Green for him and Mamah. In 1914, Mamah and two of her children, along with three others, where murdered by a servant who had set fire to Taliesin's residential wing. 

Wright rebuilt Taliesin, but the home was destroyed by another fire in 1925, when Wright was separated from (but still married to) his second wife and was living at Taliesin with his pregnant would-be third wife, Olgivanna. 

With her, Wright rebuilt Taliesin again and started the Taliesin Fellowship, in which apprentices lived and worked at the Spring Green estate and eventually Taliesin West outside Phoenix. The fellowship evolved into the Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture, which in January announced it was closing after nearly 90 years but recently got new funding and might stay open after all.  

Tour details 

Homes on the Wright Plus Housewalk are open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. June 27 in River Forest and Oak Park, Illinois. While there are guides onsite at each home, the walk itself is self-guided — visitors can tour the homes in any order they want. This year there are a few clusters of homes near each other, but they are still at least a few blocks apart.  

Tickets are $100 through May 29 and $110 after ($90 and $95 for Frank Lloyd Wright Trust members). Tickets include access to the eight homes plus admission to the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio, the Unity Temple, the Robie House and the Rookery until Dec. 31. Ruscitti said tickets are limited and have sold out in the past. 

Fast passes cost $500 and allow you to jump to the front of the entry lines that can form at popular spots during peak times. The Wright-designed homes are always popular, Ruscitti said. 

Because of the homes' historic natures, they are not physically accessible. Assisted walking devices and high-heeled shoes are not permitted inside the private residences. Children under age 12 and pets also are not permitted.  

Shuttles will be running between the Frank Lloyd Wright House and Studio, 951 Chicago Ave., Oak Park, Ill. — where participants check in and get their wristbands for the tour — and tour sites throughout the day. There will also be shuttles between the visitor center and downtown Oak Park train stations and parking garages.  

Since the walk attracts visitors from around the world, the Trust offers a Wright in the Region day tour on the Monday after Wright Plus that takes visitors to other Wright sites in the area. This year’s trip is to Wisconsin, first to see American System Built homes and the privately owned Frederick Bogk House in Milwaukee, then to Racine to see the SC Johnson Administration Building and Research Tower. The tour departs from the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio in Oak Park at 7 a.m. June 29 and costs $215 ($195 for Trust members). 

For more information and to purchase tickets, call (312) 994-4000 or see flwright.org/wrightplus.  

Editor's note: A previous version of this story had the tour's original date, which has now been changed to June 27.

Contact Chelsey Lewis at clewis@journalsentinel.com. Follow her on Twitter at @chelseylew and @TravelMJS and Facebook at Journal Sentinel Travel.

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