If the listing agent hadn't told us that this home with the dramatic pagoda-style roof in the northern suburb of Riverwoods was designed by a Frank Lloyd Wright apprentice, we never would have associated it with the Prairie style master. The listing says the unique structure was designed by Wright's "last apprentice." So who is this mystery architect? In an email, agent Peggy Cobrin reveals his identity: "Arthur Dennis Stevens, the youngest and last apprentice of Frank Lloyd Wright, served with Wright at his Taliesin studio and retreat in Wisconsin from1948 until 1953 and built the residence in 1980 for the homeowner." Cobrin also tells us that the structure for that big roof was patented, and that the support beams were curved using a special compression process. We don't know too much about Stevens, but he certainly cooked up with something unique here.
The home sits at the edge of the 500-acre Ryerson Conservation Area, on a heavily wooded and landscaped 2-acre property. "You enter the home up a series of meandering aggregate steps to the front door," writes Cobrin. "Natural materials are dominant throughout – aggregate, concrete, cedar wood, glass and stone." Inside, there are soaring, 39-foot ceilings; live trees grow out of a rockscape in the middle of the great room; and almost all of the rooms have big skylights. From above, the home looks like a compound of three different houses that have been pressed together, each with the same big arched roof. In all, the home has four bedrooms, 3.5 baths, and 5,746 square feet of living space. It's currently priced at $2,678,888.
· Listing: 7 Timberline Ln., Riverwoods [Coldwell Banker]
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