Recently our Graphic Design class took a trip to downtown Grand Rapids to tour the Meyer May House. We not only toured the house but also watched an in depth video about the renovation and refurbishing of the house into a historical destination.

Designing it Wright
This house was fully designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, from the house itself to the living area to the tableware. The house was designed for Meyer May, a clothier in early 1900’s Grand Rapids. May was a fairly short man standing only about 5’8” so Wright was sure, as he did with other homes, to personalize the house to his height. Windows were positioned just so that he could look straight down the street without anything blocking his view. Anyone not around his height didn’t have such a luxury and had panes blocking some or part of the beautiful scenery.

In addition to building to May’s height, Wright also made sure to create a warm living environment for the rest of the family. There was a nook in the living area for reading which was encompassed by shelves of books. In the video we learned that May often read to his children and after being in the house this area definitely seems like a wonderful, relaxing spot to enjoy a story or two.

The dining room area is another marvel in itself. The entire set of chairs and table are encompassed by lights on posts almost creating another room in itself. On the tour of the house we learned a few interesting facts about the dining area. The top of chairs are actually at the same height as the molding around the room so when the chairs are moved back they line up perfectly. Also, on the posts there is an area for small potted plants, when the children would have birthday parties May’s wife would swap out the plants for bowls with goldfish in them. This allowed the children to enjoy watching the fish while they ate their cake and ice cream.

Making it May
It’s said that if Wright visited a house after he’d built it, he would rearrange and “misplaced” furniture to be the “Wright” way. There is little he could do though about additions to the home. After May’s wife died, he remarried and the couple added an extension on to the house. By this time there were more children and additional room was necessary.

May also added a few things to the inside of the house. Since he was a business man, he often needed a clean pressed shirt and jacket for work. He found that regular hangers just didn’t do the trick at keeping the form. May had been using wishbone hangers at his stores and decided to incorporate them into his closet space. To do this he had his friend, who designed the wishbone hanger, create a slide out rack for him to hang his shirts on without them getting wrinkled.

Redoing it the Wright Way
Eventually the house was sold and went through two other families full of additions and changes. then in 1985, Steelcase purchased the house and began their massive renovations to restore the look it once had.
The restoration team was able to find a number of original Wright designed furniture, yarn and design samples of the carpet, and even many of May’s books. The furniture that was missing was redesigned to Wright’s specifications by looking at blue prints and drawings and comparing them to others of the time or that were still in the house. New carpet and rugs were made to look like they were when the house was first built and May’s books were rebound to look as they would have in the 1900’s. All of the light fixtures, which Wright had designed as well, were either cleaned up and restored to look like the originals or replicated.

Walls of the rooms were also repainted using not only the colors that Wright specified but the same painting technique as well. While getting paint samples to find the original colors, the team came upon a mural that wrapped around the column on the main floor. They were also able to fully recreate the mural using the colors that Wright had intended.

In all it took the team 2 years to complete the restoration of the house that took Wright only a year to design and others to create and build.

100 Years Later
The trip to the Meyer May house was an amazing experience. To see how all of the elements come together to create one friendly, relaxing home experience is inspirational to say the least. One of my favorite parts of the house though was the closed in porch area. It was designed in such a way that it almost crops what you’re looking at so you know the best view. In the end, this horizontally spreading prairie house rising out of the ground at 450 Madison Avenue is not only an amazing piece of architecture but a beautiful piece of art work as well.