A landscape the master called home

Despite the impression “Monday Night Football” may leave, Wisconsin has more to offer than dairy products, but much of it is less conspicuous and more genuine than mere tourist amusement. Madison, for example, is not only the cosmopolitan state capital, but also the starting point for a 60-mile journey into an architectural legacy.

U.S. Highway 14, known as the Frank Lloyd Wright Memorial Highway, begins due west of town and winds through beautiful countryside, past some of the pieces of the puzzle that make up the self-professed “world’s greatest architect.” I drove this bucolic byway last September, on a perfect autumn day when the deep greens were just beginning to turn to gold in anticipation of the long Midwestern winter.

You could cruise the 120 miles in a few hours and revel just in the Wisconsin landscapes. But there’s a reason it’s called the Frank Lloyd Wright Memorial Highway: This fascinating, complex architect was born, lived and worked within a figurative stone’s throw of U.S. 14, and much of his spirit remains along the way, in his buildings, including Taliesin in Spring Green, and in the hills and fields of western Wisconsin, the inspiration for Wright’s conception of “organic architecture,” which emphasized the synchronicity of structure and nature.

Wright was a product of the 19th century whose architectural vision presaged and transformed the 20th. He was born in 1867 in Richland Center, the western terminus of the highway, and he attended the University of Wisconsin. After a stint with the Chicago firm of Sullivan and Adler, he went on to international fame, first with houses in the “Prairie” style -- low, horizontal structures with flat roofs, characteristic casement windows and open, flowing interior space, meant to blend into the rolling hills of the Midwest countryside.

Wright would design iconic buildings all over the world, including his home and studio in Oak Park, Ill., but after his apprenticeship in Chicago he came home to Wisconsin, building Taliesin on family land in Spring Green, just 20 miles from his birthplace.

Wright was a celebrity, but he was still a local and thus both revered and reviled. Some, like my father-in-law, Don Jones, who was, like Wright, a southern Wisconsin Welshman, used to disparage him as an egotist, a womanizer and maybe even a murderer, referring to a 1914 fire at Taliesin that killed Wright’s mistress and six others. History seems to have absolved Wright of responsibility for the fire, clearly the work of a crazed employee. In regard to the other charges, I believe the great man might have pleaded guilty.

One story about Wright, which may be apocryphal, suggests that when asked his profession on a witness stand he answered, “I am the world’s greatest architect.”

A friend later asked why he said that.

“I was under oath,” Wright replied.

The story isn’t hard to believe. A state historical marker on the highway in Spring Green quotes the master himself: “Early in life I had to choose between honest arrogance and hypocritical humility. I chose the former and have seen no reason to change.”

Wright didn’t design any of the campus buildings at the University of Wisconsin, but as a student he was employed as a craftsman in the construction of the Science Hall, a campus landmark and one of the university’s oldest buildings. Legend has it that Wright thought it so ugly that he was inspired to become an architect.

He eventually gave Madison several landmark houses. They include the Jacobs House -- one of Wright’s first “Usonian” designs, the prefabricated structures meant to be accessible to the middle class -- and the Gilmore House (also called the Airplane House), a classic Prairie structure.

Long after his death in 1959, his designs continued to spark controversy, notably Madison’s Monona Terrace Center, originally designed in 1938. The community, initially put off by the proposed $17-million price tag and, for some, Wright’s arrogance and extravagance, debated for decades whether to build it. The project finally came to fruition in 1997 as a convention center on the shore of Lake Monona. Price tag: $67 million.

A less controversial structure, the Unitarian Meeting House near the University Hospital on Madison’s west side, is known for its soaring glass atrium, which Wright likened to hands in prayer. There are also several Wright-designed houses in Madison, all worth a look. (See www.visitmadison.com for addresses.)

When you’re ready to get on the road, go west on University Avenue through neighboring Middleton, and before you know it you’re on Wright’s Memorial Highway, so designated in 1991.

It’s about 40 miles from Madison to Spring Green, the first stop, through such Wisconsin farm towns as Black Earth and Mazomanie. Just across the Wisconsin River, near Spring Green, you’ll notice some interesting changes in topography. Madison is shoehorned into a chain of lakes on the edge of a glacial plain, rolling countryside dotted with lakes, hills and moraines.

This is extravagantly rich agricultural country, with wooded patches interspersed among the immaculate farms, but just west of Madison you pass into a more dramatic river valley landscape, characterized by ridges, plateaus and a paucity of lakes. This southwestern corner of Wisconsin, called the Driftless Area, escaped the planing and leveling effect of the most recent glacial advances. This is the landscape that molded Wright’s ideas of how buildings should fit their environment.

Familiar touches

Spring GREEN, population about 1,500, isn’t much of a town, but thanks to Wright and some other attractions it draws plenty of visitors. The Spring Valley Inn, to the east of town, reminded me immediately that this is Wright country: Its long, flat-roofed horizontal wings are made of local stone with broad overhanging eaves, and it’s topped with a little decorative tower. It was designed by a Wright associate and bears the master’s touch.

Just past the inn, turn left on County Highway C, which follows the Wisconsin River and leads directly to Taliesin, Wright’s family estate.

Just before reaching Taliesin I stopped at the Frank Lloyd Wright Visitor Center, where all tours begin. It was originally built as a restaurant, but the visitor center now houses a bookstore and gift shop and the Riverfront Cafe as well as historical exhibits, memorabilia and a few pieces of Wright-designed furniture. With lunch, I had a glass of surprisingly good local white wine and finished off with a house-baked pastry.

The 32-acre Taliesin estate, only recently opened to the public, offers daily tours May through October, from $15 for a two-hour walking tour to $80 for a sunset tour with cocktail reception. Weekend tours are available in November, December and April.

Many of Taliesin’s best-known buildings are easily visible from the road, including Wright’s Taliesin residence itself (rebuilt after the 1914 fire and again beginning in 1925); the Hillside Home School, a Prairie-style building housing Wright’s architecture students; the red Midway Barns, the agricultural center of the estate, which reminds me of the Wright-designed Marin County Courthouse in California; and one of the oldest Wright projects, the Romeo and Juliet Windmill Tower, built in 1896.

The Spring Green area boasts a few other attractions as well. On the natural side, Tower Hill State Park, just east of Taliesin, offers a scenic spot for picnics and views of the Wisconsin River, as well as some historical exhibits about the area’s lead-mining past.

From Elizabethan to eccentric

Just down the road is the American Players Theatre, a professional company that stages masterpieces of the classical repertory, mostly Shakespeare, in a lush outdoor setting. The season runs from June until October, and the extensive grounds include picnic tables and gas grills for pre-theater dinners. Bring a sweater for evening shows.

If it’s an over-the-top, borderline-tacky tourist attraction that pushes your buttons, take County Highway C until it intersects with Wisconsin Highway 23 at Taliesin and turn left, following the signs to the House on the Rock.

My first contact with the House was in 1962, when I was a student at the University of Wisconsin. Exploring the back roads of the Madison area, I saw an amateurish sign affixed to an open gate and wandered in. No entrance fee. No attendant. The path led to a bizarre, quasi-Japanese-teahouse-style house affixed to a 60-foot rock pinnacle in the middle of nowhere.

I wandered from room to claustrophobic little room, amid a clutter of unrelated tchotchkes that would stun even the most dedicated pack rat. After an hour or so I left, having seen not a soul.

I learned later that this was the work of an eccentric local visionary, originally built as a parody of Wright’s architecture, perhaps a good-natured attempt at retribution: The builder’s father had been fired by Wright.

Over the years this odd little house has grown into a huge collection of exhibit halls and attractions that defy categorization: They hold the world’s largest carousels, animated 19th century musical machines, cannons, cars and a 200-foot re-creation of an epic sea battle between a whale and a squid. There is now even a House on the Rock Resort, complete with a golf course, back on Highway C. The house is still here, but you can’t sneak in. Admission is now $19.50 for adults, and the complex is open March through November.

Turn around on Wisconsin 23, cross the Wisconsin River and drive a few miles north to Spring Green, where you can rejoin the highway heading northwest 25 miles to Richland Center. Depending on your point of view, the city, population about 5,000, is the beginning or the end of the Memorial Highway. Wright was born here, but there is scant evidence of that. The A.P. German warehouse bears his imprint. It’s being renovated as a museum.

The road to Madison is just as pleasant on the return. You can make it in a little more than an hour if you wish, but take your time and enjoy the little towns along the way. Stop at some of the fruit and vegetable stands. If you haven’t sampled Wisconsin corn, you may want to give it a try. My palate had become a bit jaded during my time away, so I was almost surprised by the sweetness of the local product.

And, yes, they’ll sell you some cheese if you ask.

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On Wisconsin’s Wright path

GETTING THERE:

From LAX, connecting service (change of planes) to Madison is available on Northwest, United, Midwest Express and American. Restricted round-trip fares begin at $198.

WHERE TO STAY:

Edgewater Hotel, 666 Wisconsin Ave., Madison; (800) 922-5512, www.theedgewater.com. This newly remodeled hotel is on Lake Mendota at the edge of the University of Wisconsin campus. Doubles begin at $129.

Spring Valley Inn, 6279 County Highway C, Spring Green; (608) 588-7828, www.springvalleyinn.com. Prairie-style inn, designed by a Frank Lloyd Wright associate, has doubles beginning at $85.

House on the Rock Resort, 400 Springs Drive, Spring Green; (800) 822-7774, www.houseontherock.com. Golf and family attractions. Two-room suites begin at $145.

Usonian Inn, E 5116 Highway 14, Spring Green; (877) 876-6426, www.usonianinn.com. Doubles begin at $49.

Prairie House, E 4884 Highway 14, Spring Green; (608) 588-2088, my.execpc.com/~phouse/. Doubles begin at $67.

WHERE TO EAT:

L’Etoile, 25 N. Pinckney St., Madison; (608) 251-0500, www.letoile-restaurant.com. Specializes in regional cuisine, emphasizing fresh Wisconsin meats and produce; menu changes seasonally. Entrees $25-$30.

Plaza Tavern, 319 N. Henry St., Madison; (608) 255-6592, www.theplazatavern.com. A venerable local institution close to campus but not catering just to students. This is the home of the noted Plazaburger ($3.10); most main dishes are pub fare and are $2-$4.

Riverview Terrace Cafe, in the Frank Lloyd Wright Visitor Center, Spring Green; (608) 588-7937. Serves lunch and early (till 6 p.m.) dinner; all dishes are $9.50; nice desserts and local wines.

Culver’s, 2405 U.S. Highway 14, Richland Center; (608) 647-7790, www.culvers.com. This has what I’ll characterize as some of the best fast food anywhere. Culver’s, a Wisconsin phenomenon with franchises in several states, is renowned for two things: the tasty Butterburger and frozen custard.

TO LEARN MORE:

Some useful websites: For more information, go to www.springgreen.com, www.franklloydwright.org, www.richlandcounty.com, www.taliesinpreservation.org and www.visitmadison.com.

Wisconsin Department of Tourism, P.O. Box 7976, Madison, WI 53707-7976; (800) 432-8747 or (800) 372-2737, fax (608) 264-6150, www.travelwisconsin.com.

James Dannenberg is a judge who lives in Kailua, Hawaii.