Frank Lloyd Wright Price Tower

We visited the Frank Lloyd Wright Price Tower located in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, had a nice lunch in their restaurant and took the tour of the building and museum.

Photography of the museum, penthouse, apartment, art gallery, boardroom and gift shop is not allowed, so this blog covers the exterior and only the public areas. 

This building dates from the mid to late 1950's, but was designed much earlier to be part of a four unit group of skyscrapers in New York. The great depression brought and end to that plan, so this was redesigned to be located in the prairies of Oklahoma as a single structure.

This building originally combined both residential applications and business ventures including shops and a restaurant.  The building now offers visitors the ability to stay in one of the former apartments now used as hotel rooms, have a drink at the bar and a meal in the restaurant.

The docent guided tour includes a visit to the executive office of Mr. Price, his surprisingly small board room, an example of an apartment restored to its 1956 appearance and a very good museum showing the building history and how the furnishings and built ins were created. 

The favorite deep red color  of Frank Lloyd Wright was used on the outside areas and serves as a tie to the same color used on the inside of the tower to visually tie the inside and outside together. 

The decorative shades over the windows were located in either a vertical or horizontal direction depending if they were to shade a commercial or residential space. 

A rather elegant sundial is found on the grounds

These brass emblems are found on each floor and are the center of each of the projected wings of the building.

There are a number of oddly shaped portions of the building that seem to define a readily recognizable use. 

This view of the lobby includes seats intended for those visitors awaiting someone to guide them to whom they were to see back in the day. A glimpse of the revised lobby for those taking the tour  is seen thru the doorway. It is well worth your visit to see the entire lobby, and woven metal shades/drapes 

The elevators have had a more recent addition to the light lens showing images of the construction of the tower.

This is typical of the patina found on each of the exterior sun shades

Well shaded view from the tower 

Small open air patios are found on several floors

Outside stairways connect the floors

This view shows a good example of the pattern that is used throughout the building.