December. The filling station is built. All circles and ovals, it connotes flow. Gowan is pleased.
Austin Heller counsels Roark: You're not getting any more commissions because you don't care to cater to people. Sell yourself! Roark: Most people don't understand me. Only a very few have
Roark waits idly in his office for customers. Good thing he's saved up his money!
February: Mrs. Wayne Wilmot visits Roark and tells him she wants him to build her a country house. You see, she's a big fan of Austin Heller, and she heard Roark built Heller's house (which she hasn't seen), and so Roark must build her house, too. English Tudor style, please. Roark: I don't do styles. Find another architect.
March: Mr. Robert L. Mundy wants a house in Connecticut, and Heller recommended Roark to build it. Mundy: Build it just like the plantation house I used to envy back in my Georgia childhood. Roark: A house like that wouldn't be you, it would be a monument to your envy. Find another builder.
April: Nathaniel Janss, another friend of Heller, wants to see if Roark will build a 30-story office building on Broadway. Roark explains his philosophy—how ornamentation and anachronistic styles look silly, and how functionality is the key. After some talking, Janss is won over. Roark draws up some designs, which Janss takes to his board of directors. They don't get it; what's the matter with Gothic? The board refuses to grant the commission.
John Fargo, another self-made man, owns a department store and wants Roark to design another store next to it. Fargo had seen the filling station and the Heller house. Roark is his man. Fargo: Here's the space; here's how much I have to spend. Build me a store, please.
In May, Whitford Sanborn visits Roark. He owns an office building designed by Henry Cameron, and now he wants a new country home. Cameron, retired, has recommended Roark very highly. Roark explains the sort of house he builds, and Sanborn is pleased. Mrs. Sanborn is not; she wants a French chateau.
What a nice, sharp, concise character sketch!Mrs. Sanborn was the president of many charity organizations and this had given her an addiction to autocracy such as no other avocation could develop.
Whitford Sanborn contracts with Roark for the house, but Fanny Sanborn, the ass, nags and niggles and demands small revisions. The costs mount. During construction, Roark suddenly figures out an improvement in the design of one wing. (Roark is still learning his trade.) There's no money left for the revision, but Roark is so set on the correction that he pays for the change out of his own pocket.
Sanborn is pleased with the finished product, but the Mrs. refuses to live there. They pack off to Florida instead, and the Sanborns' son moves into a few of the house's rooms. The AGA bulletin calls the Sanford house uninhabitable and cites it as an example of architectural incompetence.
No comments:
Post a Comment