I know it might seem cliche to say that I was impacted by a building built by the famous architect Frank Llyod Wright but it is true. From a very young age, I have always been fascinated with buildings. I grew up in a very rural area where I spent a lot of time outdoors amid tall pines and creeks that traversed my family’s property. My father was a carpenter and he actually built the house we lived in. Once I stumbled upon Fallingwater I thought residential architecture was going to be my niche in life because it combined an interest in buildings with nature.

Once I was in high school and my career counselor asked me what I wanted to go to college for I immediately said Architecture! I had no idea what skills or abilities that career path would entail. I just knew I liked buildings, especially this one.

Fallingwater was the first building I ever came to appreciate from an architectural standpoint. I was fascinated by how integrated the building was to the surrounding landscape. It didn’t soar up into the trees but instead hugged the earth as if it was just another rock outcrop with the multi tiers flowing off the sides like the brooks waterfall. I thought it was a house that everyone would want to live in.

At the time I didn’t quite appreciate the level of design and construction ingenuity that a project like that required, I just thought it looked cool and I wanted to design things like that. I knew next to nothing about Frank Llyod Wright and to be honest, I haven’t heard many good things about him since then. This makes me look back and ask was I truly interested in Architecture or did I just think this one building was cool. Sometimes it only takes one thing to spark an interest.