Johnson Wax Building - Frank Lloyd Wright

An architectural masterpiece by Frank Lloyd Wright, the Johnson Wax Headquarters is the world headquarters and administration building of S. C. Johnson & Son in Racine, Wisconsin. Designed by American architect Wright for the company's president, Herbert F. "Hib" Johnson, the building was constructed from 1936 to 1939. Also known as the Johnson Wax Administration Building, it and the later built Johnson Wax Research Tower were designated as a National Historic Landmark in 1976.

The Johnson Wax Headquarters was set in an industrial zone and Wright decided to create a sealed environment lit from above, as he had done with the Larkin Administration Building. The building features Wright's interpretation of the streamlined Art Moderne style popular in the 1930s. In a break with Wright's earlier Prairie School structures, the building features many curvilinear forms and subsequently required over 200 different curved "Cherokee red" bricks to create the sweeping curves of the interior and exterior. The mortar between the bricks is raked in traditional Wright-style to accentuate the horizontality of the building.

The warm, reddish hue of the bricks was used in the polished concrete floor slab as well; the white stone trim and white dendriform columns create a subtle yet striking contrast. All of the furniture, manufactured by Steelcase, was designed for the building by Wright and it mirrored many of the building's unique design features.

The entrance is within the structure, penetrating the building on one side with a covered carport on the other. The carport is supported by short versions of the steel-reinforced dendriform (tree-like) concrete columns that appear in the Great Workroom. The low carport ceiling creates a compression of space that later expands when entering the main building where the dendriform columns rise over two stories tall. This rise in height as one enters the administration building creates a release of spatial compression making the space seem much larger than it is. Compression and release of space were concepts that Wright used in many of his designs.

Throughout the "Great Workroom," a series of the thin, white dendriform columns rise to spread out at the top, forming a ceiling, the spaces in between the circles are set with skylights made of Pyrex glass tubing. At the corners, where the walls usually meet the ceiling, the glass tubes continue up, over and connect to the skylights creating a clerestory effect and letting in a pleasant soft light. The Great Workroom is the largest expanse of space in the Johnson Wax Building, and it features no internal walls. It was originally intended for the secretaries of the Johnson Wax company, while a mezzanine holds the administrators.

The Johnson Wax Administration Building is one of the many Wright buildings which are featured as part of the new Frank Lloyd Wright Trail celebrating the 150 anniversary of the artists birth. #FLW150 The trail includes: The SC Johnson Wax Administration Building, The Johnson Research Laboratory, The Golden Rondelle Theater, The First Unitarian Society Meeting House, Wyoming Valley School Cultural Arts Center, Monona Terrace in Madison, and more. Wisconsin is home to more than 40 Frank Lloyd Wight structures, so come visit Wisconsin and explore the new FLW trail.

For information on the Frank Lloyd Wright Trail, visit: tourinfo@travelwisconsin.com - http://travelwisconsin.com 800-432-8747

photos: Stephen Smith
reporter: Ilona Kauremszky
music: Kevin MacLeod: http://incompetech.com/
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