Editing Wasmuth Portfolio (section)

{{Short description|Folio of lithographs by Frank Lloyd Wright}}
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[[File:Wasmuth portfolio - Dana-Thomas House.jpg|thumb|A plate from the ''Wasmuth Portfolio'', depicting the floor plan of the [[Dana–Thomas House]]]]
The '''''Wasmuth Portfolio''''' (1910) is a two-volume folio of 100 lithographs of the work of the American architect [[Frank Lloyd Wright]] (1867–1959) and his studio.

Titled ''{{lang|de|Ausgeführte Bauten und Entwürfe von Frank Lloyd Wright}}'', it was published in Germany in 1911 by the [[Berlin]] publisher [[Ernst Wasmuth Verlag|Ernst Wasmuth]], with an accompanying monograph by Wright. It contained plans and perspectives (in linework only) of buildings designed between 1893 and 1909.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2024-07-05 |title=The Wasmuth Portfolio |url=https://mhnsw.au/stories/general/the-wasmuth-portfolio/ |access-date=2025-03-07 |website=Museums of History NSW |language=en}}</ref> It was the first publication of any of Wright's work to appear anywhere in the world. 500 copies reserved for American distribution burned in the [[Taliesin (studio)|Taliesin]] fire, delaying full recognition of Wright's accomplishment in his native land for years to come.

The portfolio is significant as a link between Wright's pioneering American architecture, and the first generation of [[modernism|modernist]] architects in Europe. Wright toured Europe for a year from October 1909 through October 1910, partly to support the publication of the portfolio, but also to experience European architectural history at first hand.

Wright's early influence in northern Europe is unquestionable: [[Le Corbusier]] is known to have had and shared a copy;  Czech architect [[Antonin Raymond]] and Austrian architects [[Rudolph Schindler (architect)|Rudolf Schindler]] and [[Richard Neutra]] all re-located to the United States in hopes of working for Wright; and one look at [[Willem Marinus Dudok]]'s 1924 [[Hilversum Town Hall]] betrays its origins. At the time of the portfolio's publication, three influential architects of the twentieth century ([[Le Corbusier]], [[Ludwig Mies van der Rohe]] and [[Walter Gropius]]) were all working essentially as apprentices in the atelier of [[Peter Behrens]] in Berlin,<ref>Turner P.V. (1983), Frank Lloyd Wright and the Young Le Corbusier  Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians, Vol. 42, No. 4 (Dec., 1983), pp. 350-359 Published by: University of California Press on behalf of the Society of Architectural Historians Article</ref> where it has been said that work stopped for the day when the portfolio arrived.{{Citation needed |date=May 2009}} If this story is true, it reveals the magnitude of the immediate impact of Wright's architecture in European circles, since Behrens could have conceivably received a copy of the Wasmuth portfolio merely days or weeks after its publication.

Wright would never admit that the exchange worked both ways, always claiming that he took nothing from his year in Europe, but the work of Wright scholar [[Anthony Alofsin]] suggests that Wright was heavily influenced by the work of the [[Vienna Secession]].{{citation needed|date=September 2017}} In turn, the Dutch [[De Stijl]] movement follows Wright's designs by just a few years. De Stijl's major contributors credit Wright with some influence.

Approximately half of the images in the ''Wasmuth Portfolio'' are believed to be reworked renderings by the architect and one-time Wright assistant [[Marion Mahony Griffin]], whose visual style has a lot to do with the publication's success.<ref>{{cite web | url=http://www.strata-arch.com/women-architecture-v-marion-mahony-griffin-1871-1961/ | title=Women in Architecture V: Marion Mahony Griffin (1871-1961) | date=29 March 2018 }}</ref>

As of 2009, the ''Portfolio'' is in print as '''''Drawings and Plans of Frank Lloyd Wright: The Early Period (1893–1909)'''''.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Wright |first=Frank Lloyd |url=https://archive.org/details/drawingsplansoff0000wrig |title=Drawings and plans of Frank Lloyd Wright : the early period (1893-1909) |date=1983 |publisher=New York : Dover Publications |others=Internet Archive |isbn=978-0-486-24457-0}}</ref>