Pleasant Home, Prairie School museum in Oak Park, Illinois.
Pleasant Home is a 30-room residence with custom woodwork, detailed art glass windows, and an enclosed circular porch located in Oak Park. The rooms contain carefully crafted details that show how quality materials and skilled work were used throughout every space.
Banker John W. Farson hired architect George W. Maher in 1897 to design this Prairie School house for him. The construction marked a turning point in regional architecture and showed new possibilities for residential design during that decade.
The house displays early 20th-century American design through its long horizontal lines, natural materials, and way of connecting to the landscape around it. Visitors can see how rooms and windows were carefully arranged to bring daylight and nature into daily living.
Visiting the house requires care with the historic rooms and their furnishings, so guests should walk carefully and follow staff directions. The location in Oak Park is easy to reach and can be visited during open hours that work with most schedules.
The house is the only publicly accessible museum designed by George W. Maher, an architect whose other works remain largely closed to visitors. This makes it a rare place to see the full vision of a designer who shaped the region's style.
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