Frank Lloyd Wright, designer

This sweeping library table embodies the design vocabulary of architect and theorist Frank Lloyd Wright. Envisioning an American style of architecture distinct from European classical and Renaissance traditions, Wright developed his “organic architecture” to reflect what he saw as man’s innate need for a direct relationship with nature. Intending to reform not only design, but society through better design, Wright introduced an earth-hugging alternative now called “Prairie style” after the wide plains of the Midwest. This table’s top is cantilevered over the center supports with strong horizontal planes, and just as Wright’s houses revolve around a central chimney stack, the table’s integrated parts surround a central cabinet tower. This table’s structural simplicity shows Wright’s philosophical ties to Arts and Crafts Movement reformers, and its straight lines and planes show kinship to geometric abstraction in fine arts of the same period.