Frank Lloyd Wright: Broadacre City

When American architect Frank Lloyd Wright (1867–1959) proposed Broadacre City (1929–35), he advanced an astonishing claim: that the metropolis was obsolete. In its place, Broadacre was to be a “Usonian” synthesis, an unprecedented landscape unsullied by convention or history, consisting simply of “architecture and acreage.” With its low-density carpet of small plots, predominantly one- and two-story buildings, and seemingly infinite territory, the ruralized landscape of Broadacre would sustain new levels of individuality and freedom, far more democratic than a traditional metropolis could ever support.