Developer demolishes Frank Lloyd Wright building in Montana

WHITEFISH — A commercial building in northwestern Montana designed by Frank Lloyd Wright was demolished overnight after negotiations aimed at saving the historic building failed.

Developer Mick Ruis had agreed to sell the former medical center in Whitefish for $1.7 million if a purchaser was found by Wednesday.

The Chicago-based Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy had attempted to negotiate a deal, but the conservancy says the owner's terms did not provide realistic means to acquire the building.

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An attorney for Ruis told the Flathead Beacon that the owner had listed the building for sale more than a year ago, giving ample time for groups to find a buyer.

The brick building was designed by Wright in 1958, a year before he died. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2012.

With its large orb half inside and outside the building, strong lines and indoor/outdoor landscaping, Whitefish's Wright building was among the few medical buildings in his portfolio.

Dr. T. L. Lockridge insisted on the building's design, despite his partners' protests.

The most singular design element was a 7-foot-diameter plastic sphere, once lit by floodlights, in the middle of a glass wall that looked into the former patient lobby. A 25-foot-diameter brick planter circled the sphere on both sides of the wall.

A "vehicular mishap" crushed the sphere and planter, according to the building's history submitted to the National Register of Historic Places. Two small, semi-circular planters replaced the large version, and the sphere is a memory.

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The lobby was reworked to accommodate offices. Once a bank and then a developer's office, it's now the law offices of Morrison & Frampton.

Sharon Morrison, a former building owner, told the Tribune in a feature on the building that the offices made it impossible to replace the globe, which would have taken up a lot of space if added back to the design, which the offices in the former lobby didn't allow anyway.

"When we got to the building, it had long since been changed," Morrison said. "We tried to preserve all we could."

The rooftop gardens made way for HVAC machinery. The flat roof fared poorly in Whitefish winters, but the pitch of the replacement roof is not particularly noticeable.

"Frank Lloyd Wright said if you wanted level floors and a non-leaking roof, he was not your guy," Morrison said. "He was more interested in the art."

The building retained many of Wright's design elements. He wanted a home-like medical clinic, and the large curved fireplace and woodwork that helped set the tone remain. Skylights added brightness while maintaining privacy.

A red tile incorporated into the brickwork had his signature. Even the masonry of the orange bricks he chose was done with thought and Wright's main source of pride in the building, Morrison said. The mortar, tinted to match, is flush with the bricks vertically and grooved horizontally to emphasis the horizontal nature of the low-slung building.

Another unique, especially for the time, design element is in the corners of the entry, where glass meets with no upright structure. Among the few, understated decorative elements is the cementitious fascia, large trim with arched shapes running around the top of the façade.

"I always thought it was unattractive before we owned it, but it does have an interesting aura," Morrison said. "You know when you're in the building that it's different. The light is different."

The building was just south of Whitefish's downtown at 341 Central Ave. The guestbook featured signatures from around the world.

Another Frank Lloyd Wright building was a hotel in Stevensville, the Bitter Root Inn. It burned down in the 1920s.

in 1909, Wright was unknown outside Chicago circles when he came to Montana to design a summer resort and later an entire community in the booming Bitterroot Valley.

Just two buildings remain of the University Heights Community north of Darby. His plans called for 60 cabins, as well as a clubhouse, manager's office and reflecting pool. The cabins would be arranged in groups, connected by a circular drive, with paths running throughout the property.

The community was marketed toward professors at the University of Chicago who could buy a cabin and some orchard land, which would provide them with some income, he explained.

"The site of the community was an ideal place for people escaping Chicago's steamy summers," Donald Leslie Johnson wrote in a 1987 article in the Montana Magazine of Western History.

Wright sketched three cabin options, all in the prairie style that made him famous. All were fairly inexpensive, according to the National Register of Historic Places. None of the cabins had kitchens. Instead, communal dining was encouraged, both because it helped build a sense of community and it eliminated the need for servants in each residence.

As planned, the community attracted some intellectuals, as well as bankers, businessmen and a wine importer. However, those elaborate plans never came to be.

Only 12 of the planned 60 cabins were built, along with the clubhouse and manager's office.

Today only one cabin and the office, which has been converted to a small cabin, remain. Others were sold off or lost to fire. The clubhouse was demolished in 1945.

The town he planned never came to be.