(figure available in print form)
Unity Temple located near Chicago is primarily a reinterpretation of the cube shape, it is a closed cubic form. (2) Wright used pre-pored concrete blocks to concrete blocks to construct the Temple as if he were using the building blocks in the Froebel Kindergarten method. He used a slab-like roof which would appear later in his domestic designs. An ideal interior space of many levels is created with wall planes and piers. The building is monumental yet scaled in human terms meaning that a person moving within the interior senses himself relative to it, not lost in its size. The design is dominated by flat planes, large expanses of surface harmonized with deeply recessed areas and ornamentation. The pebbled surface of the flat areas appears as rich texture at close range. The building is solid, grounded, open and closed. Wright let the great worshipping room determine the exterior. He felt that Unity Temple expressed “the idea of the reality of the building as the space within”.
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The interior spaces are interwoven, their boldness softened by the light from the ceiling, natural light by day and artificial by night. The exterior appears powerful, protective and secretive.
The entrance is on a raised platform. The path to the great hall is dark and turning, suggesting an inward spiritual journey, which opens to a large, well lighted room. (The Yale Center for British Art in New Haven by Louis Kahn gives its visitors a similar experience.) Balconies were created in the spaces between the four piers located at the corners. These piers also carry heating ducts which give an even distribution of heat. The congregation sits in a tightly packed square. The configuration and compactness of the seating result in a strong sense of being in the place. The interior is a symphony of large masses and detailed areas a visual experience of contrasting movement and repose.
Unity Temple is closed on three sides.(3) The entrance also serves as a link to the secular area, Unity House which is entered at midpoint of its large rectangular space set on a single axis. The interior of Unity House is subdivided by movable screens enabling the members to manipulate the space, redefining path and place according to changing needs. The utility core, including kitchen and sewing room, is located away from the public space yet accessible to it.
Unity Temple (figure) relates to the surrounding space (ground) through recesses and projections in the shape of the buildings, the relationship of the Temple and the House, columns set into recessed space of the building and gardens.
(figure available in print form)
A building is a combination of mass and void with varying degree of emphasis placed on those respective elements. Wright was committed to mass, seen throughout his career in the dominating hearth, piers, slab roofs and great expanses of surface. At the same time he searched for a new definition of void, not as a result of mass, but as space, an integral design element.
Wright said “Unity Temple is where I thought I had it”,
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meaning that he thought he had created a building where the reality was no longer in the walls and roof. He was trying to resolve the challenge of “getting out of the box”
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of traditional architecture. By this he meant that the interior space opened to the outside and the outside came in. As we shall see, he went on to find a solution that surpassed anyone’s efforts.