A house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in the town of New Canaan in Fairfield County Connecticut just went on sale for $8 million. Called Tirranna, the 7,000 square feet The estate, built in 1955 for Wright’s friends Joyce and John Rayward, is one of the famous architect’s largest residential projects.
Tirranna takes its name from an Australian Aboriginal word meaning “running waters”, referring to the babbling stream adjacent to the house. It is one of three Wright homes, including Fallingwater, Pennsylvania, to be located near a waterfall.
Curved outdoor patio and circular pool. Courtesy of Coldwell Banker Realty.
According to SEO by Coldwell Banker Realty, the main structure of the classic Usonian mansion is designed in a semi-circular style and features seven bedrooms, eight bathrooms and a wine cellar that has been converted into a bomb shelter.
The home sits on 14 wooded acres. The land immediately surrounding the house was turned into gardens by Frank Okamura, the designer of decades curator of the bonsai collection at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, and landscape architect Charles Middeleer. A greenhouse, a circular swimming pool, a tennis court, a barn, a playhouse and a one-room guesthouse are also found on the grounds.
Interior view of Tirranna, with Philippine mahogany woodwork and Cherokee red flooring. Courtesy of Coldwell Banker Realty.
The interior features Philippine mahogany paneling, complementing the Wright trademark Cherokee Red Colorundum concrete flooring. The architect also planned built-in shelves, a skylight for an abundance of natural light and large windows overlooking nature. All lighting, cabinets and furniture are original.
The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, under construction (circa 1950s). Photo: Charles Phelps Cushing/ClassicStock/Getty Images.
Wright himself briefly stayed in the house while supervising the construction of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum some 40 miles away in New York. With its emphasis on circularity, Tirranna seems to mirror the spiraling concrete ramp that makes the Guggenheim one of the city’s most iconoclastic architectural pieces. The greenhouse was even built using some of the scalloped glass windows left over from the Guggenheim project.
The circular windows used in the Tirranna greenhouse come from the Guggenheim project. Courtesy of Coldwell Banker Realty.
Although small in size, New Canaan became an unlikely hotbed of modern architecture in the mid-20th century. Phillip Johnson’s iconic Glass House is near Tirranna, and the town is home to homes by revered architects Marcel Breuer and Eliot Noyes. They were part of the Harvard Five, a group of architects who settled in New Canaan in the 1940s after graduating from the famous university. Like Wright, they emphasized simplicity, functionality and honesty in materials.
Tirranna last sold for $4.8 million in 2018. It is one of the few Wright properties to enter the market in the past year, which also includes the Mrs. Clinton Walker House in California (Wright’s only beachfront home), the Westhope House in Oklahomaand the George W. Smith House in Illinois.
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