It took a little song from a big voice to persuade Frank Lloyd Wright to accept a renovation job at the Isabel Roberts House in west suburban River Forest, but it appears that the act produced a one-of-a-kind result–the only home the great American architect both built and restored himself.
”It`s the only home Frank Lloyd Wright laid his hands on a second time,” said Tony Scott, the current owner, who has put the house up for sale. ”He restored it for my father in 1956 and 1957 just before he (Wright)
died,” Scott said.
”He knew of Wright, knew of his work and knew he was a remarkable man,” Scott said, explaining why his father set out to convince the famed architect to work a second time on the house nearly 50 years after it was constructed.
Warren Scott enlisted his best weapon in the battle to lure Wright back to River Forest–his wife Ruth Terry Scott. She was a mezzo-soprano opera star who had played Carnegie Hall and the Metropolitan Opera in the 1930s and later taught voice at the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago.
”When Dad made arrangements to meet Wright, he took her along. She had always been a striking woman and a great entertainer. She ended up giving concerts–private stuff–at Wright`s Taliesin (in Spring Green, Wis.). The persuasion process took some time. Dad approached Wright first in 1952, again in 1954 and finally made the deal in 1955,” Tony said.
Isabel Roberts was the daughter of Charles Roberts, one of Wright`s friends and neighbors in Oak Park. Wright owed much of his early success to Roberts` patronage.
Isabel worked closely with Wright in his Oak Park studio for many years, doing chores ranging from bookkeeping to occasional project design. In 1908, Wright built the River Forest house for her.
Warren Scott brought his family from California to Chicago in 1951 and purchased the home. It had not been well maintained by its previous owner, Tony Scott said, leading his father in quest of Wright.
The renovation of the Roberts house began in late 1956 and took nearly 15 months to complete. A year later Wright died.
”Because of the renovation, this house has all of the good things in a Wright house and very few of the bad. Problems like leakage, for instance, which plague some of his houses were corrected here.”
The only major problem with the house is also its signature–a tree growing up through the roof of the sun porch.
”He allowed for the expansion of the base and the trunk when he built the house, but got a little absent-minded when he did the rehab,” Scott said, pointing to the way the tree now is pushing the roof aside.
Scott has hired architect John Thorpe, who has worked on other Wright projects, to correct the problem.
”Once I got to be 35, I guess I found maturity,” Scott said, explaining his interest in the life and career of Wright.
”As a Wright owner, I decided to get more involved, talking to the people at the Wright Studio (in Oak Park) and picking it up little by little.”
”I think Wright in his later years realized that he built most of his houses for his own height, 5 feet 7 inches, and in the restoration he did some things to bring in more light and space than when the house was constructed,” Scott said.
Living room bookshelves were removed, an entryway planter was taken out and two small bedrooms were combined into a master suite at the rear of the house in the Wright renovation. The balcony above the living room was reinforced with steel supports and some mechanical systems were replaced.
The real estate brokers who will attempt to sell the house don`t approach the task as they do other homes. There was not a quick walk-through of the property with standardized checklists. Instead, there was a champagne and brie reception with a personally guided tour by Scott, though conducted around various movers.
”Basically, you have a whole different marketing plan for a home like this,” said Carol Wissinger Daniel, center sales manager for Coldwell Banker Residential Real Estate Services at Harlem and North Avenues in Chicago.
”You have to find the type of client who will buy it as a piece of art and not just a house.
”There are not very many Wright houses that go on the market; people love them so much,” Wissinger said. ”This house has not been on the market for 35 years. That shows you how people care when they buy a Frank Lloyd Wright house.”
But sales are sales and sprucing up a house is one good way to ensure a better price, even when the listing is $980,000. Reverence to Wright`s architectural skill aside, the eagle eyes of the agents spotted such foibles as mismatched wood, a hard-to-reach furnace and dreary carpets.
”Well, it`s Mr. Wright`s carpet. He hand-picked it. So I don`t care what`s under it; unless it`s gold, it stays,” Scott said. ”It`ll be cleaned and buffed, but it stays.”
A Wright-designed couch will also stay, although it has been the object of the family dog`s affection for so long that it, too, will need restoration. But Philippine mahogany trim and brass cabinet hardware aside, Wright`s residential designs were meant to be lived in. That is why Tony Scott`s parents sought out the architect for the renovation and why Scott prefers to sell to someone who will reside in the house and not just hold it as an investment.
”I want to see that the house goes to somebody who won`t care about writing the checks to take care of it. Heck, I wouldn`t mind it going to somebody who can write the check to pay for it,” he said.
Because so much of Wright`s work is in demand, moving from one of his homes can provide a bonanza above and beyond the normal profits of a moving-day garage sale.
In preparing to move, Scott found a number of Wright-designed stained-glass panels in his tool shed and has found a private buyer for the collection.
”It is remarkable, the things that are in here. There have to be 2,000 panes of leaded glass, at least,” he said, pointing to the two-story living room windows crisscrossed with the leaded design. ”Except for the couple I plunked out with a BB gun, they`re all original.”
Tony Scott lived in the River Forest house from the age of 6 until he was 14 and headed off for boarding school and college. Among other pursuits, Scott is now a partner in a New Zealand trading firm, produces documentaries for public television and contributes to a rugby magazine.
He is somewhat of a renaissance man like his father, who held a number of academic and business positions over the years. One of Scott`s next projects will be a film expedition into China, retracing the steps his father and nine others took on a 1929 sociological exploration of the vast country.
Although his father`s business ventures took him away from Chicago for extended periods, the River Forest house remained the family home. But with the death of both his parents within the last 18 months, Scott decided to place it on the market.
”It`s somewhat of a trauma to say goodbye. You can`t live in a place like this and have one ounce of romanticism in your body and not get caught up in it,” Scott said.
”But I`m not a fanatic about it. My future is in the West, with my office in L.A. and my ranch in Oregon.”
”I am buying an organic design in Oregon–in Scott`s Mills, by the way
–and it has three trees growing up through the deck. Once you`ve lived with a tree growing through the house, I guess you just expect it to be part of the deal from then on.”
