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Wright’s social vision of the sanctity of labor and his penchant for technological vision of material innovation intersected, again, in the building complex he designed for S.C. Johnson & Son, Inc., beginning in 1936.
Eleven years later Wright built the company’s Research Laboratory Tower. The project illustrates Wright’s integration of the technological and experiential dimensions of architecture. The Administration Building is entered through a sequence of low, dim spaces from which one emerges into a grandly-scaled room lit from above. Sunlight filters into the space through bundled planes of glass pyrex tubes, which allude to the company’s investment in chemical research. Where conventional buildings would have had a heavy cornice, Wright bridged the gap between wall and roof with a continuous band of glass. The effect of the filtered daylight is one of wondrous luminosity, which transforms the ordinary workspace into a kind of sanctuary.
The lustrous ceiling is supported on concrete columns whose tops swell into broad caps resembling lily pads, prompting Wright to compare the space to a forest glade. Structural engineers were skeptical of the design’s integrity, however, and in a now-legendary episode. Wright loaded a test column with sand bags to demonstrate its ability to support the roof.
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