
I had to think for a minute: diamonds? Was a "diamond" a shape that Wright used? Is the diamond one of the suits in Wright's architectural deck?
The answer was yes...and no.
In the Martin House complex, there are a number of places where Wright employed "diamond" shapes. They include: the floor "lites" in the pergola, the pavers on the pathway to the east of the pergola, the negative space formed by the planters at the "crossing" of the conservatory, the pool / fountain in the garden wall between the drying yard and the carriage house, and the ceiling millwork in the Barton House. But wait a minute - those last two forms are composed of half-squares rotated 45 degrees, otherwise known as right triangles (no pun intended). That led to the realization that, in the Martin House, all of the "diamonds" are really just squares (ubiquitous in the composition) rotated 45 degrees to the surrounding forms or volumes. There is an almost sequential nature to Wright's introduction of the rotated square on the floor of the pergola: pedestrians headed north down the pergola follow a pathway of rotated squares, thus prepared for the dynamic 45 / 90 degree interplay of the conservatory crossing.

In the River Forest Tennis Club, Banff National Park Pavilion and Robie House, these right triangular exedra take on the role of "prows" at either end of long, rectangular volumes. In the Robie House, this prow association ties-in to Wright's identification of the house as a dampfer, or ship. Such a parti was already in place as early as 1902, with the ceiling millwor

Many of the triangular "prows" in the Martin House complex seem to form arrows that correspond to the major axes of the composition, suggesting lines of force that flow from - and through - the composition, aligned with the cardinal directions and their 45 degree divisions. In the Barton House, for example, these "arrows" in the ceiling millwork serve to mitigate the fairly traditional, boxy corners of the dining room and living room; they direct the inhabitant's eye out of the east and west windows, toward the surrounding landscape and structures. The dynamic plan of the conservatory crossing forms a virtual compass at a major node in the cross-axial complex - a point from which all space-shaping lines in the complex seem to emerge.
Thus, the simple diamond question led me to a rabbit's-hole of contemplation regarding the geometry of the Martin House complex, and the dynamic dance produced by a simple "turn" of the Wrightian square.
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As a visitor on one of my tours pointed out, the 45-degree angle becomes unavoidable at the crossing of the glass roof, visible from below in the conservatory. Wright prepares the eye for it with the rotated squares in the pergola, the fountain at the base of the Nike, and, carrying the eye upward, the millwork at the crossing of the conservatory.
- Harvey Lichtblau, Docent
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