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Teater's Knoll: A Studio Retreat

The Art Museum of Eastern Idaho hosted a presentation today about Teater’s Knoll, the only Frank Lloyd Wright designed building in Idaho. The event Teater’s Knoll: A Studio Retreat was a presentation about Archie Boyd Teater and his wife, Patricia Teater’s retreat.  

Archie Boyd Teater was a famous artist known for his paintings of the Tetons. The public loved his paintings, but he also had a passion for painting and creating different art pieces. His wife, who knew Frank Lloyd Wright, wanted her husband to have a retreat so he could gain more inspiration to make more art, so Frank Lloyd Wright designed their beautiful retreat.  

It is a beautiful building right off Highway 30, south of Bliss. After both Archi and Patricia passed away, however, it was abandoned. 

Henry Whiting, who is an architect, was able to buy the property and renovated the building. This process has helped the building look like the masterpiece it was intended to always look like, said Miyai Abe Griggs, the executive director of The Art Museum of Eastern Idaho. 

“He has had to really do a lot of subnational restoration work to make it what Frank Lloyd Wright envisioned for the studio,” she said.  

Whiting’s uncle, Alden Dow, was one of Frank Lloyd Wright’s students and Whiting grew up close to him in Michigan. When Dow found out this property was abandoned, he told Whiting right away. After Whiting graduated from university he was around the Sun Valley area, but the house was still not on sale. He followed up with it until it finally was on sale when Patricia Teater passed away and he bought the house. His goal was to restore it to how Wright wanted it.   

“He actually, as a matter of fact received a Right Spirit Award from the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy,” Abe Griggs said.