Let's Go Places: Spring Green, Wisconsin

It's now Friday and exactly one week into MegaVacay 2024.  Our travels are now taking us about an hour west of Madison to the small town of Spring Green.  How small?  Population 1,500.

What's in Spring Green you ask?  If you said Frank Lloyd Wright, then give yourself a gold star.  His ancestors emigrated to the area in the 1800s, and ended up owning a bunch of land here.  In 1911, FLW moved here and built his dream house on a hill, which is called Taliesin (Welsh for "shining brow" as in "the shining brow of the hill that the house is built on").  Spring Green is the ultimate FLW destination.  But wait, there's more...so much more.

Friday - a solo day

Friday was Frank day.  I got up early and headed for Spring Green for a four hour estate tour of Taliesin.  Not to worry, there are shorter tours for the feint of heart, but I was in a go big or go home kinda mood.

My interest in FLW is 95% about his work, 4.95% about the woman that he left his first wife for, and 0.05% about him as a person.  He was Wisconsin born and raised, then moved to Chicago and became a Big Deal, and then he met Mamah Borthwick and both he and she left their spouses for each other which resulted in the life lesson that he wasn't quite enough of a Big Deal to overcome the societal norms of the time, and then his next move was to beat it up to the boondocks in Wisconsin.

But the "we had to leave Chicago to shack up" version of the story doesn't give Spring Green enough credit.  FLW could have moved anywhere in the world and he chose Spring Green.  Yes his family was there but still, he chose Spring Green.

I didn't need to see a single one of the buildings on the property to come around to his way of thinking.  This is a gorgeous, gorgeous place.

I try very hard not to research too much about these places before I go there.  All I knew was that he built Taliesin on land that his mother owned in 1911 and in 1914 a Hell of a Thing that happened that destroyed most of the house.  He was obsessed with rebuilding, which he did and then in the 1920s there was another oopsie that resulted in him rebuilding for the third time.  Later on the Wisconsin winters got to be a little much so he built a second house in Arizona called Taliesin West, and spent his summers in WI and his winters in AZ for the rest of his life.

(PS if you are interested and have an extra 12 minutes on your hands, this is the Youtube video where I learned about the 1914 tragedy and the 1920s rebuild.  So this is everything that I knew about Taliesin going in.  The 1914 story is something that makes a huge impact, and I think it's more effective for you to find out about it from another source, so that's why I'm dancing around it but not saying what happened.)

So like I said, I had no idea what we were going to do for four hours or what was on the estate besides the house.  A shuttle bus took us a good ways from the visitors center to the first destination of the day, which was Hillside School.  The weather was perfect and the surroundings were gorgeous, so I almost resented going inside.

The backstory is that FLW's aunts started a school, and in the 1890s he upgraded their school house.  Later in the 1930s he started an architecture apprenticeship program and at that time he added on to the building and transformed it into living and working quarters for his minions.

Did your school cafeteria look like this?  Mine did not.

After the school, we went walking up the hill.  The next thing to see is the Romeo and Juliet windmill, which was an early FLW build, again for his aunts. 

And then FLW's sister's house.  She had a budget, so he gave her one of his first "affordable" designs.  In the FLW world, "affordable" just means "small with highly functional use of space". 

Her view cost nothing.

This picture of cows that I took from her back yard also cost me nothing.

From there we kept on walking, and got to see the estate's barn.

The barn has not been restored, so we didn't get to go inside.  I didn't mind because there was plenty of eye candy on the outside.

We continued up the hill to get to our ultimate destination.

At this point we were two hours into the four hour tour, and it was time for a break.  Light refreshments were served on the terrace outside of FLW's bedroom. 

While we were on the terrace our guide told the story of the 1914 tragedy.  There was one person in the group who had not heard the story before, and she definitely had a reaction.  Heck, I have a reaction every time I hear the story and maybe a little more so being in the actual location.

From there we finally got to go inside!

Apart from being gorgeous, my two favorite things about Taliesin are:

• I am so jealous of his youngest daughter who grew up here.  He built her an attic loft over the residential wing of the house, which must have been so fun for a child.
  
• You may have heard the FLW buildings tend to have design flaws such as leaky roofs and bad foundations, and every FLW site will tell you that the rumors are true.  So what about FLW's own house?  Not to worry, he didn't design anything for his clients that he didn't do for himself.  Here is a cracked support beam near the window of his bedroom, caused by the foundation issues in that section of the house.
  

In FLW's defense, part of the reason for the building issues at Taliesin was that he was having his apprentices experiment and then fix things as they went along, so it's kind of an issue of the cobbler's kids having no shoes.

So that was Taliesin.  Afterwards I went to the family cemetery at Unity Chapel, which is close to Taliesin but not on the estate.  The current owners allow tourists to stop by and pay their respects.

I had a hard time finding Mamah's grave.  The location is listed here as "at the base of the largest tree behind the Unity Church".  There are a few candidates for "largest tree", but eventually I found it.  If you're facing the front of the chapel it's to the left of the building.  In FLW's eulogy to Mamah, he said "we lived frankly and sincerely", and the stone definitely says "we lived" but I can't make out the rest.

FLW's grave is fairly close, but a bit more prominent and up front.  Not that it matters, but his body isn't here.  When the third Mrs. FLW passed away, his body was moved to AZ and they were buried together.

After that I went into the town of Spring Green.  Anne had told me that there was an awesome bookstore there, so I went to Arcadia books.  I hardly ever buy books, so I hardly ever go to bookstores, but when I do the usual result is that I walk out without buying anything.  But this was the one in one thousand times when I walked into a bookstore and a book jumped off the shelf and said "read me".  I'll save the full story for another time, but that book is currently a contender for favorite book of the year.

With that I got in the car and drove back to the Airbnb and indulged in my nightly bike ride.

Saturday - the return to Spring Green

Saturday morning I headed back to Spring Green for The House on the Rock.  I rolled up in the parking lot and met my crew.  That's right, it was the weekend so Anne and Engie were free to join me.

Remember how I like to go in blind to places?  All I knew was that the House on the Rock was, well a house built on a rock and I knew there was something crazy about it.  There are no tours, it's a "show up anytime during business hours and do your thing" kind of deal.  The website recommended allowing three hours for the full experience, which I thought was crazy for a self guided tour.  

Engie told the story much better than I can - you can do all of the research that you want going in but you're not going to believe it until you're there and two weeks later I'm not sure that I believe what I saw.  The place is indescribable.  

Right up front there is a Creepy Doll Wall in the restroom at the visitor's center, which is a taste of what is coming.

The house is OK.  In summer there are too many trees to really be able to see it from the outside, and you can't see the outside from the living area of the house.

 

The infinity room is a different story.  This was my favorite part of the house.

And from there...it just gets weird.  The chandelier made up of chandeliers is the most normal picture that I can show you.

A few years ago my husband went out on the equivalent of a Male Spa Day with his best friend, and they went to a sensory deprivation tank.  Mind you, I have never been to a sensory deprivation tank, but I feel like that is the best way to describe The House on the Rock.  There is so much sensory overload of sights and sounds that it ends up being a deprivation.  Once you start, there is No Way Out, so you pretty much have to do walk through everything to get to the exit.  We did at least get a few outdoor breaks for the gardens.

I don't know how to summarize the House on the Rock except to say that it is something else.  And also that I would recommend bringing at least two friends with you.

Afterwards we went to the Overlook, which is touted as having good views of the house.  Well, maybe in winter but not in summer.  All that we saw were trees, which was fine but it wasn't worth stopping for.

What was worth stopping for was a return trip to Spring Green for lunch at Wander Provisions.  They only have a few tables, which were full, and it was raining cats and dogs so we had lunch in Engie's car.  I had a cheese, mushroom, and kale sammie. 

I made a return visit to the bookstore to buy the book that leapt off the shelves the day before, and then Anne called it a day but Engie and I carried on to the Cave of the Mounds for a cave tour.

 

And then we parted ways and I went back to my crib.  I closed the night out with - you guessed it! - another bike ride.  Partly because it was a lovely night and partly to process the sights and sounds of the House on the Rock.

And with that our time in Spring Green has come to a close.  We only have one day left on vacation...I wonder where we're going next.  

Who's been to Spring Green?  Taliesin????  House on the Rock????