Peter A. Beachy House
Date: 1906
Address: 238 Forest Avenue, Oak Park, Illinois
City: Oak Park, Illinois
Accessibility: Private
Category: Residential
In 1906, Emma Beachy, the daughter of Peter Fahrney, a successful doctor and real-estate investor in Chicago, commissioned Wright to renovate a Gothic cottage on Forest Avenue for her children and second husband, Peter A. Beachy. Wright’s renovations were dramatic, and left little more than the foundation of the original structure intact. The resulting house is situated on the northern corner of its large lot, a strategy that maximizes the exposure to natural light. The house features gabled roofs and is finished in red brick on its first story and stucco with dark wood trim on its upper level. In contrast to many of Wright’s Prairie houses, which featured casement windows with abstracted panels of clear and colored glass framed in zinc and copper caming, the casement windows of the Beachy house were designed with heavy wood mullions.