Frank Lloyd Wright designed this beautiful Prairie School house for Decatur industrialist Edward P. Irving and his wife Bernice Irving. Completed in 1909, the house is located on a private lane, Millikin Place, with three other fine Prairie School residences. This is the second of two photographs of the Edward P. Irving House in my "Macon County, Illinois" album. Photographs of the two other Wright-inspired houses on Millikin Place, the Robert Mueller House and Adolph Mueller House, also are included in this album.
Prairie School was a late 19th and early 20th century architectural style. American styles tend to be derived from other countries and cultures. But Prairie School is all-American, developed out on the prairie. Architect Louis Sullivan's teachings and philosophy were the inspiration for the style, which began in 1890s Chicago. Frank Lloyd Wright set the standards for the genre, which was based on the tenets of the Arts and Crafts movement. It was most common in the Midwestern United States, but its influence was felt around the world— especially in north-central Europe and Australia.
Prairie School style architecture is usually marked by its integration with the surrounding landscape, horizontal lines, flat or hipped roofs with broad eaves, windows assembled in horizontal bands, solid construction, craftsmanship, and restraint in the use of decoration. Horizontal lines were intended to unify the structure with the native prairie landscape of the Midwest.Lowered ceilings, using a change in level to demarcate space, open planning, indirect lighting—all these can be traced to this modern, American style.
The E. P. Irving House is a significant architectural and historical property in the Decatur Historic District, a residential historic district in the Millikin Heights neighborhood of Decatur. The district encompasses the city's historic Near West and Southwest neighborhoods and was formed beginning in the 1850s and continuing through the 1920s. The Decatur Historic District was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1976.
Decatur is the seat of Macon County. The city was founded in 1829 and is situated along the Sangamon River and Lake Decatur in central Illinois. Decatur has an economy based on industrial and agricultural commodity processing and production. The city is home of private Millikin University and public Richland Community College.
Decatur's estimated population for 2019 was 70,746, making Decatur the thirteenth-most populous city in Illinois, and the state's sixth-most populous city outside the Chicago metropolitan area.
Loading contexts...
