Frank Lloyd Wright designed the house in front of you, the Meyer May House, one of his finest Prairie houses and one of the most completely restored buildings in his body of work. Wright designed the Meyer May House in 1909 for a Grand Rapids clothing merchant of that name, creating a low-slung horizontal composition of Roman brick, wide overhanging eaves, and art glass windows that practically defines the Prairie Style he was perfecting during those years. The house was later subdivided and its interiors significantly altered.
In 1985, Steelcase Inc. — the Grand Rapids office furniture company — purchased the house and undertook a meticulous restoration, returning it to its 1909 appearance down to the original carpet patterns, light fixtures, and built-in furniture that Wright designed as part of the total composition. Steelcase makes the house available for free public tours, a remarkable act of civic generosity from a company that understands the relationship between design history and its own business. Stand on the sidewalk and look at the way the horizontal lines of the roofline, the window bands, and the masonry coursing all emphasize the earth rather than the sky — Wright's argument that American architecture should grow from the prairie rather than aspire toward the Gothic.