This Frank Lloyd Wright–Inspired Home Had Termites So Bad It Was Being Advertised as a $170K Lot

In 1989, Hope and Terence Alcorn were looking for a new home. They had sold their house in Buffalo, New York, and had spent Terence’s birthday house hunting in Pittsburgh. As they were leaving a brick, colonial-style house from the early 1900s, their realtor asked them what they thought. "It’s not really our style," they replied, explaining that they had been living in a Frank Lloyd Wright, the Gardener’s Cottage, and liked contemporary, organic architecture. The realtor told them: "Meet me again at five. I have a house to show you."

The property, it turned out, was the Abraam Steinberg House, designed by Peter Berndtson and Cornelia Brierly, former apprentices of Lloyd Wright who had worked on Fallingwater. Cut from brick, concrete, and redwood, the rust-colored house had a linear, geometric façade, and was surrounded by trees. Like Fallingwater, it had strong horizontal lines, cantilevered sections of roof, high-level clerestory windows, and almost all of its furniture built-in. Named after the doctor who had commissioned it and built between 1949 and 1951, it was now being advertised for $170,000 as an empty lot: it had a termite infestation, and it was assumed that a buyer would demolish it.

"We saw it, put in an offer and moved in the next week, because the bank insisted that the house had to be free and clear of termites before they would give us a mortgage," says Hope. Unusually, the owners gave the Alcorns prepossession of the house so that they could treat the termites and obtain a mortgage, which would allow them to fund the more extensive restoration work needed. The fact that Terence was an architect gave them the confidence to take the project on. "We fell in love with the house and were very excited to think that we would be able to live here," Hope says.

The termites had destroyed the house’s stud walls, but thankfully weren’t keen on the brick, glass, concrete, or redwood. Getting rid of them, though, involved taking the whole house apart. "You treat termites in the soil," Hope explains. The built-in furniture had to be carefully removed, the concrete floors jackhammered out, and the original radiant heating pipes removed. The soil was tested and, once deemed safe, treated with a chemical called chlordane. Only then could it all be put back together again.

The couple even consulted the house’s original drawings, housed at nearby Carnegie Mellon University, to faithfully recreate the red concrete floors, and reinstall the built-ins. The only large piece of furniture the Alcorns bought was their dining room table and chairs. On the walls, Hope hung some of her own artwork. "It definitely has a strong sense of house…to tell you the truth, I loved the minimalism. Everything was already here," says Hope. "We tried to keep whatever is in the house for the next caretaker." 

The restoration cost around $35,000 and took seven months, during which time the couple, who had a newborn, stayed with family. Shortly after completion, the house was given a plaque by the Pittsburgh History and Landmarks Foundation, which credited the couple for saving the house. Since then, they replaced the roof and spent a further $50,000 on repointing.

Terence died in 2021, and Hope has now listed her family home for $1.2 million. The three-bedroom house is shaped like a pizza slice, with a round edge where the bedrooms are located, and two straight sides, with the living room in the corner where they meet. At its heart is an atrium, with a tree that, from a distance, appears to grow out of the roof. The 7,000-square-foot plan is arranged mostly over a single story, with a ramp, rather than stairs, bending around the curved wall of the kitchen to access the primary bedroom above.

"From the exterior the house looks very linear, but you come in and it’s round and feminine. You move in a circle around these ramps to get to the top levels, with the atrium in the center and of course the big, Frank Lloyd Wright–type fireplace in the living room. The brickwork is exquisite," says Hope. The center of the home has a circular, wooden ceiling, with concentric circles extending outwards around the atrium.

The floors are all heated, and on winter evenings, Hope and her family would put the sofa cushions on the floor and build a fire. "It’s simple, and yet it’s really powerful in the strength of the brick of the fireplace," she says. "It’s a playful space too. It invites you to engage with each other, and it’s just open and comfortable."

In the 37 years Hope has lived there, the house has been visited by numerous tour groups and architecture students. She would often catch people looking at it from the street, and invite them in. "For me, it’s even been a part of my identity, sharing this space. I want other people to experience what I experience when I’m in this house." She hopes that it will go to a public entity, like a university, so that more people are able to enjoy it in future. "I feel like I’ve been lucky to live here. I’ve been caretaking it for the next generation," she says.

Related Reading:

Tracing Frank Lloyd Wright’s Influence

Meet the Recipient of the First Frank Lloyd Wright Endowed Professorship