Frank L. Smith Bank [SEP] architect
Frank L. Smith Bank
The Frank L. Smith Bank, now known as the Dwight Banking Center of Peoples National Bank of Kewanee, is a bank building in Dwight, Illinois, United States that was designed by American architect Frank Lloyd Wright. Wright's earliest designs for the building date to 1904, but it was constructed in 1905 and opened in 1906. The design of the bank building deliberately rejects the classical influences common at the time, and is meant to evoke an air of simple dignity.
History.
Frank
Lloyd Wright's early designs for the Smith Bank date to 1904. The building, located in downtown Dwight, Illinois, was constructed in 1905 to a Wright design. Wright designed the bank building to house the real estate office and bank of Frank L. Smith, a prominent local citizen who would later be elected to Congress. Smith had decided that his real estate clients needed a simple and convenient way to obtain financing, so he founded the bank and hired Wright as the architect. The bank opened for business in 1906.