Administration Building for the Larkin Company, Floor Plan and Perspective (Verwaltungsgebäude für the Larkin Company, Grundriss und Perspektive)

The exterior perspective of the Larkin Company Administrative Building reveals the bold structural expression of an office complex designed to service a mail-order soap company in Buffalo. The Larkin commission was the largest and most complex of Wright’s commercial structures to that date, and it was secured through the efforts of Darwin Martin, a company executive (see the nearby Martin House rendering). Located within a grimy industrial complex, the building appears fortress-like, but the use of a light well or atrium around which each floor is built provides light and a central focus to the interior. The projecting corner pylons house staircases and add visual strength to this, one of Wright’s most starkly modern designs. Although acclaimed by architects and critics as a landmark of American architecture, the Administrative Building was demolished in 1950.