Choice Review

This photographic study of Wright's furniture and interiors represents an expansion of David Hank's pioneering The Decorative Designs of Frank Lloyd Wright (CH, Jul'79). The text is organized chronologically, with four primary chapters on Wright's pre-Prairie, Prairie, post-Prairie, and post-1936 work plus two additional chapters on Wright's commercial line for Heritage Henredon and on colors, materials, and detail. With nearly 400 photographs, this study constitutes a uniquely valuable visual resource on Wright's decorative designs; but the writing, which is mostly confined to captions, lacks consistency and often raises as many questions as it answers. The captions contain many sound formal and structural observations, but they also include editorializing comment, speculation, odd facts, repetition, comments about the whereabouts of objects, and references that seem to lead nowhere. There is no summarizing view. What percentage of Wright's work is represented here? What determined what is included? How often did Wright design complete furniture ensembles for clients? Did he do partial ensembles? A list of opus numbers, a bibliography, and a glossary conclude the text. General; upper-division undergraduate through professional. J. Quinan; SUNY at Buffalo