Designers: Kelly Bair & Kristy Balliet
Location: Oak Park, Illinois
Photography: BairBalliet
Contractor: Steve Matticks
Structural Engineering: John Daley
Originally designed by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1911 and considered his first “flat-roof” house, the Oscar Balch house was designed around a central linear datum from which living spaces are linked through enfilade. Renovated by BairBalliet in 2025 to accommodate a modern and evolving family, the house’s excessive horizontality, a trope of the prairie style though even more exaggerated here, provided a conceptual framework from which to design from. Intended to house anywhere from one to eight family members ranging in age from 5 to 75 years old, depending on the week, the original compartmentalized spaces on the lower level were spatially preserved for contrasting programmatic uses but conceptually linked through the design of windows, custom millwork, material finishes and lighting. The upper level restored a former door opening discovered in the original floor plans provided by the Frank Lloyd Wright Trust. Once the entry to one of the Balch’s separate sleeping quarters and later closets for the next inhabitants, the door was reopened to serve a direct connection between the primary bedroom and a new primary bathroom. The alteration both preserves and extends the historic lineage of the house but updates it for today’s inhabitants.
