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Architecture critic Patricia Lowry can be reached at plowry@post- gazette.com or 412-263-1590.
White wisteria with runners 2 inches thick and English ivy two stories tall were climbing the trees. Rhododendrons, a lilac, a dogwood and a hemlock were blocking views to the stream and winged euonymus was scampering up a stone wall.
Invasives and natives were having a field day at Fallingwater and it was time to whack them back.
With the 21/2-year stabilization of the famous house complete, its owner, the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, is turning its attention to the grounds.
Last Saturday, about 30 volunteers -- Boy Scouts, landscape architecture students, neighbors and others -- used loppers, clippers and their own gloved hands to help tame the landscape near the house on Bear Run.
Frank Lloyd Wright designed the house around the woodland landscape, diverting trellis beams and canopies around existing trees. But he did not do a planting plan for the rest of the site. Over time, ornamental plants introduced near the house by E.J. and Liliane Kaufmann's groundskeeper developed minds of their own.
"We're afraid it's becoming an incubator for the rest of the reserve," which has grown to more than 5,000 acres, said Cara Armstrong, curator of buildings and collections. "We don't want things being washed downstream, either."
Under the guidance of Armstrong and horticulturist Richard Liberto, the rain-soaked outing was one of the first steps toward the removal of invasive species, a component of Fallingwater's five- to seven-year landscape master plan produced by Andropogon Associates of Philadelphia and Marshall Tyler Rausch of West View.
Among its goals are reinforcing and maintaining...