G u g g en h eim

m u seu m

by

lloyd wright

frank

architect

FRANK LIOYD WRIGHT

LOCATION

1071 FIFTH AVENUE , NEW YORK

DATE

1956-1959

BUILDING TYPE

ART MUSEUM

CONSTUCTION SYSTEM

REINFORCED CONCRETE

STYLE

CONTEMPORARY STYLE

ANNUAL VISITORS

3 MILLIONS

Solomen R.Guggenhiem museum is the

first permanent museum (rather than
converted from a private house) built in
USA

frank was commissioned to design a

building to house the Museum of NonObjective Painting

This building was immediately recognized

as an architectural landmark and the
most important building of Wright's late
career.

This design got

inspired from
inverted ziggurat

FORM AND FUNCTION SHOULD BE

ONE, JOINED IN A SPIRITUAL UNION
- FRANK LLOYD
architect Frank Lloyd Wright
worked for Louis Sullivan (1856
1924) in his Chicago-based
architecture firm.
Sullivan is known for steel-frame
constructions, considered some
of the earliest skyscrapers.
Sullivans famous axiom, form
follows function, became the
touchstone for many architects.
This means that the purpose of a
building should be the starting
point for its design. Wright
extended the teachings of his
mentor by changing the phrase
to form and function are one.

ARCHITECT DESIGNED THIS

BUILDING WHERE FORM AND
FUNCTION ARE FOLLOWING

GEOMETRIC FORMS
most buildings contain
interior spaces that are
rectilinear and for wright,
geomentry is the basic
building of nature

rectangularTriangul Oval
form
ar form form

square
form

Frank Lloyd Wright thought

in curves and straight lines
which is helding symbolic
significance
i.e.,trianglesfor structural
unity
Nearly all of these forms can be found in
circles
__suggested
the architecture of the Guggenheim
infinity
Museum
spire
__aspiration
(Look down and you find circles in the terrazzo floor beneath your
spiral __organic
feet.
Look up at the underside of the ramp and you see it punctuated
process
by triangular
lighting panels.
square __integrity

Wright believed that structure created beauty and geometric forms

gave his work a consistent and systematic quality.

PLAN OF MUSEUM:
RESTORATION IN BUILDING:

In 1990, the Wright building was closed

to the public to enable the expansion
and a major interior restoration, which
was overseen by the firm.
The restoration opened the entire
Wright building to the public for the
first time, converting spaces that had
been used for storage and offices into
galleries.
This museum was restored and
expanded and It contains 4,750 square
meters of new and renovated gallery
space, 130 square meters of new office
space, a restored restaurant, and
retrofitted support and storage spaces.

FIRST FLOOR
PLAN form and function are one is thoroughly visible in
The principle

the plan for the Guggenheim Museum. According to Wrights

design, visitors would enter the building, take an elevator to the
top and enjoy a continuous art-viewing experience while

SECTION OF MUSEUM:
Frank Lloyd Wright's
original plans this Museum
called for a ten-story tower
behind the smaller rotunda,
to house galleries, offices,
workrooms, storage, and
private studio apartments.
Largely for financial
reasons, Wright's proposed
tower went
unrealized.Associates
Architects revived the
tower plan with its eightstory annex, which
incorporates the foundation
and framing of a smaller
annex

The tower's simple facade and grid pattern

highlight Wright's unique spiral design and
serves as a backdrop to the rising urban
landscape behind the museum.

IMPORTANT FEATURES:
impact-echo technology, in which sound waves
are sent into the concrete and the rebound is
measured in order to locate voids within the
walls
Overlapping curves, complex intersections, a
long interval of smooth planes interrupted by the
double beat of the vertical cylinders that contain
the men's and women's washrooms

Ramp described as a simple

spiral whose diameter
increases as it rises

From street, looks like a white ribbon

ribbon,curled into a cylindrical stack which is
made up of reinforced concrete
. Colour of interior walls is not stark white,
which Wright hated, but a kind of soft ivory and
having a spiral ramp which is wider in top than
bottom
. the ramp is a helix, complicated helix, being
interrupted by a bulging balcony at each
revolution.
The ramp leans outward, but other elements,
such as the structural fins that transfer the
weight of the ramp to the outside walls, and
rise to support the central skylight, lean in.

IM PO RTAN T FEATU RES:

A monument to
modernism, the
unique
architecture of
the space, with
its spiral ramp
riding to a
domed
skylight,continue
s to thrill visitors
and provide a
unique forum for
the presentation
of contemporary
art.
Internally, the viewing gallery forms a helical spiral
from the main level up to the top of the building.

LIGHTING:
ARTIFICIAL
LIGHTING
WHICH
GIVES
BRIGHTNES
S AT THE
ENTRANCE
OF MUSEUM

ARTIFICIAL LIGHT
EMMITING FROM
SMALL LIGHTS

ARTIFICIAL
LIGHTING
IN
GALLARIE
S
ARTIFICIA
L LIGHT IN

GALLARIES

SKYLIGHT AT THE CENTRE

OF THE MUSEUM IS THE
MAIN SOURCE OF

NATURAL LIGHT WILL ALLOW

THROUGHT WINDOWS

DISPLAY METHODS IN MUSEUM:

Most of the criticism of the building
has focused on the idea that it
overshadows the artworks displayed
within, and that it is difficult to
properly hang paintings in the
shallow, windowless exhibition niches
that surround the central spiral.
The walls of the niches are neither
vertical nor flat (most are gently
concave), meaning that canvasses
must be mounted raised from the
wall's surface.
The limited space within the niches
means that sculptures are generally
relegated to plinths amid the main
spiral walkway itself.

Paintings are displayed along the walls of the

spiral and also in exhibition space found at
annex levels along the way.

Thank u

by
sw apnika