A Kankakee, Illinois, home designed by Frank Lloyd Wright has just sold for $449,000, reports Crain’s Chicago Business. Built in 1900, the home was among the designer’s earliest commissions and represents the burgeoning genesis of his then soon-to-come architectural revolution, but it had remained largely unseen since it was bought by its previous owners in 1976.
“This was truly a family home, and the homeowners were very private people, so few guests have been in the house in the last 50 years,” says Victoria Krause Schutte of @Properties, Christie’s International Realty, who represented both the buyer and seller. Since the previous owners did not allow tours, its listing was not only an opportunity for potential buyers, but offered a rare chance to see images of the interior of the home.
Known as the Warren Hickox house, the home sits next to another Wright design, the Bradley House. A brother and sister—and their respective spouses—commissioned the pair of homes at the turn of the century. The Bradley House, the larger of the two, was built for B. Harley Bradley and his wife, Anna Hickox Bradley, while the Warren Hickox House was designed for Anna’s brother, Warren, and his wife, Laura. The Bradley house, the larger home, is perhaps the more famous of the pair—and often credited as Wright’s first Prairie home—though the Warren Hickox property shares many similar qualities and is just as monumental.
