Frank Lloyd Wright: World Heritage sites in the US

Perhaps Wright's most famous building is the Guggenheim Museum on New York's Upper East Side. It would make the nearby Museum of Modern Art look like a "Protestant barn," the architect allegedly boasted. The Guggenheim opened its doors to the public in October 1959 — six months after Wright's death.

Here Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959) points at the model of the Price Tower in Oklahoma City, one of his more than 400 buildings. The eight structures added to the list of UNESCO World Heritage sites, including the Guggenheim Museum, a church and several residential buildings, were built between 1905 and 1959 — and show how versatile Wright was.

Fallingwater in the state of Pennsylvania is one of America's most extraordinary residential buildings. Wright designed the house for department store owner Edgar Kaufmann, who had asked for a house with a view of the waterfall. But his architect had a different idea — and prevailed. The American Institute of Architects called Fallingwater the "all-time best work of American architecture."

The Robie House, a residential building near the University of Chicago, is an example of the prairie style design Wright used for many buildings. Prairie houses are characterized by their natural building materials, including unprocessed stone, and they tend to be spread out rather than vertical. Wright was a fan of buildings that fit into their natural environment.

Taliesin West, Arizona: Wright's own home and studio is another example of prairie style architecture. Unlike Robie House, this 1937 building actually stands on the prairie. Wright spent his winters under the Arizona sun.

Taliesin in Wright's home state of Wisconsin is the summer counterpart to his Prairie House in Arizona. In 1914, it gained notoriety when one of his employees killed seven people with an axe, including Wright's lover, and set the house on fire.

Hollyhock House, a striking home in Los Angeles, was designed by Wright and built from 1919 to 1921 for oil heiress Aline Barnsdall Hollyhock. Wright was busy with the Imperial Hotel in Japan at the time, so his son Lloyd Wright supervised the work in LA. A special feature: the windows on the outside are small, and light flows into the rooms mainly from the courtyard.

Wright built the detached house, also known as Jacobs I, in 1937 for his friend Herbert Jacobs. Jacobs challenged Wright to build a house for $5,000 (today, that would be $89,000, or €79,000). Wright only exceeded his budget by $500. After just a few years, the two-bedroom house grew too small for the Jacobs family, so Wright built them a second house: Jacobs II.

Unity Temple in Oak Park, Illinois is one of 10 churches designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, but the only one on the World Heritage list. Wright built it for the Unitarian Universalist Church that his family attended. Keeping street noise out, the building has no windows on the ground floor. Light streams in from windows in the roof and the upper floors.