Edgar Tafel

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Detail photo of Brodie Fine Arts Building, showing the large studio windows that Tafel designed for the facility at, SUNY Geneseo.
Detail photo of Brodie Fine Arts Building, showing the large studio windows that Tafel designed for the facility at, SUNY Geneseo.

Edgar A. Tafel (born 1912) is an American architect who began his career as an apprentice to Frank Lloyd Wright at Taliesin (studio) alongside with William Wesley Peters, John Howe and Abrom Dombar among others. Today, Tafel is considered the "unofficial guardian of the Frank Lloyd Wright School".[1] This is despite the rift that developed between Tafel and his late mentor when Tafel left Taliesin to pursue his own work and family.[2] Tafel worked on several of Wright's most famous projects including Fallingwater, Wingspread, and the Johnson Wax Headquarters.

Tafel is also recognized for his own work including the First Presbyterian Church Addition on Fifth Avenue in New York City, the 1964 master plan for the campus of SUNY Geneseo and its "design gem" Brodie Hall, and the 1947 Silver House in Racine, Wisconsin. He has also published books about Wright including Years with Frank Lloyd Wright (1985) and About Wright (1993), and produced a film The Frank Lloyd Wright Way, which won first prize at the 1995 Houston International Film Festival.

In 2006, Tafel gave $3.2 million to Cornell University's renowned Department of Architecture.[3] to endow the Edgar A. Tafel Professorship in Architecture and the Tafel Architecture Lecture Series.[4]

[edit] Honors

[edit] References

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