Less than two years ago, the building was thought to have been rescued from financial woes. Now the new owners have it on the auction block and some W

The Plan to Save Frank Lloyd Wright’s Only Skyscraper Isn’t Going as Planned

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2024-10-01 18:30:04

Less than two years ago, the building was thought to have been rescued from financial woes. Now the new owners have it on the auction block and some Wright-designed furnishings have already been sold.

Price Tower, Frank Lloyd Wright’s only realized skyscraper, in Bartlesville, Okla., is a national historic landmark. It is currently for sale. Credit... Joseph Rushmore for The New York Times

Frank Lloyd Wright’s only realized skyscraper is just 19 stories, but even 70 years after it was built, Price Tower sits higher than most buildings in Bartlesville, Okla., and the view from the top still stretches to the horizon where the rolling prairie starts to take shape.

The tower is a landmark in Bartlesville, and a rarity in the architect’s portfolio. Designed by Wright to resemble a tree, with green, oxidized copper paneling, it’s featured on a mural nearby that depicts bison, an oil well and other anchors of the city’s heritage.

Once a buzzy hub of business life, and briefly occupied by Phillips Petroleum, the oil company that has long called Bartlesville home, it has struggled for many years to find an anchor tenant. It was reinvented as a nonprofit arts center in 2001 and soon added a boutique hotel and restaurant, but its major benefactor, the former Phillips chief executive C.J. Silas, also known as Pete, died a decade ago.