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[Fallingwater dressing room, west tower, second floor]
Dressing room, west tower, second floor.
This room has one of the more interesting of the many creative details in the house. On the far right in the photo is a window that goes from the floor almost to the ceiling, and swings opens inward and to the right. If you look closely in the photo (especially in the larger version) you'll see that it opens into semi-circular cut-away in the built-in desktop. This room is directly above the kitchen, in the middle of the 3-story west tower, so the windows you see are part of an unbroken wall of glass windows over 30 feet high. Out of the photo to the left is the master bedroom, and off to the right is a door leading outside to the west terrace.
Photo by the National Park Service
Click here or on photo for a larger (671x954 pixel, 187k) version.

Wright used only a few elements throughout the house, so that a sense of familiarity soon reassures whoever visits or inhabits it. However, Wright was never content with consistency; he structured the whole western tower block using mutations of his themes. Supported on three sides by stone walls, the floor slabs of this portion of the house do not have parapets. On the contrary they are beveled to meet, but not pierce, the glazing membrane that here - and only here at Fallingwater - becomes a vertical curtain three stories high. This sheer expanse of glass and steel is not treated as a flat facade, but is stepped forward in accord with the angled character of the house.

- Edgar Kaufmann, Jr., Fallingwater: A Frank Lloyd Wright Country House, p. 110.


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