Russell & Ruth Kraus House (Ebsworth Park)

The Russell and Ruth Kraus House at 120 North Ballas Road in Kirkwood, Missouri (1957) is the only Frank Lloyd Wright building in the state. Russell Kraus was an artist and art teacher who had long admired Wright's work, and he and his wife Ruth commissioned the house late in Wright's career — it was one of the last Usonian houses Wright designed before his death in 1959. The house is a masterful late Usonian: board-and-batten cypress siding, in-floor radiant heating, a carport integrated into the composition, and the characteristic open plan that dissolves the boundary between living, dining, and workspace. The Krauses lived in the house for decades, and after Ruth's death the property was acquired by the St. Louis County Parks system and opened to the public as Ebsworth Park. Rick McNees photographed the house extensively for the Wright-Site archive — 14 photographs document the exterior and grounds.