The Clients Who Made Modern Architecture Possible

Kaufmann commissioned Fallingwater and, when he had the cantilever design reviewed behind Wright's back, set off a dispute over the extra steel that still divides the record.

Guggenheim commissioned the museum that bears his name and died a decade before it opened.

Barnsdall envisioned Hollyhock House as a live-theater complex, ran over budget, and fired Wright, though the two stayed friendly.

Johnson commissioned the Johnson Wax buildings to remake his family company's image, and got a leaky roof and a legendary retort from Wright for his trouble.

Farnsworth commissioned Mies's most famous house, then sued him over its cost, in a dispute historians still argue over how to read.

Fritz Tugendhat, with his wife Greta, commissioned Villa Tugendhat, then fled Czechoslovakia with his family in 1938 and never saw it again.

Greta Tugendhat was the one who actually initiated the commission, and returned decades later to lecture on the house she and Fritz had built.

Bronfman approved one design for the Seagram Building, then scrapped it entirely on his daughter's word.

Lambert wrote the letter that changed the Seagram Building's architect, then trained as an architect herself and founded a major architecture institution.

Greenwald was Mies's most repeat client of all, commissioning tower after tower, until a 1959 plane crash ended it.