Structure and Ornament

"Geometric ornament" was a design philosophy created by the architect Louis Sullivan. Wright first came into contact with the architect during his apprenticeship at Adler and Sullivan in Chicago which began in 1888. Wright soon became a very important figure in the offices there,reaching the post of head designer after only a year. Sullivan, obviously recognising the talent of Wright, bestowing upon him the important tasks of Sullivan's design sketch translatior and also the task of designing the outside commissions for residential houses for important clients that the office itself did not deal with.
This ability to trust Wright with such work allowed Sullivan to continue to develop his own design philosophy. This brought Wright to describe himself as, "A good pencil I became in the Master's hand, at a time when he sorely needed one. Because I could be this to him he had more freedom than he had ever enjoyed before." (1) Sullivan was allowed to develop the idea of an organic architecture. He saw nature as being a force that could provide architecture with form through the relationship between structure and ornament. Ornament was not to be an attachment but more, "of the surface and substance, rather than on it."(2)
A link can be seen here between Sullivan and Froebel as both were centered around the idea of natural geometric forms. As Robert McCarter points out,"His study in ornament was in effect both a philosophy and a method of formal composition; it introduced Wright to the world of ancient forms and geometries that served as the beginning for all his subsequent designs."

(1)Frank Lloyd Wright, An Autobiography,London:Faber 1945. Book Three:Work,p126
(2) Louis Sullivan, Kindergarten Chats and Other Writings, New York: Dover, 1979. (quotes to be found in Robert McCarter, Frank Lloyd Wright: Architect, Phaidon Press Limited, 1997. p15.






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Above.The offices of Adler and Sullivan where Wright
worked as an apprentice. The tower was where
Wright's own office was situated, the only worker
with the exception of Sullivan to have his own office.

Above is a drawing by Louis Sullivan entitled
"Interpenetration"
It is taken from' A system of Architectural
Ornament, According with a Philosophy
of Man's Power's', by Sullivan, 1924.