Edgar J. Kaufmann Sr., owner of a Pittsburgh department store, commissioned Frank Lloyd Wright in 1934 to design a weekend house at Bear Run, the family's retreat in the Laurel Highlands. Instead of placing the house to look at the waterfall, Wright set it directly over the falls.
Reinforced concrete terraces cantilever out from a core of local sandstone, and the sound of the water fills the rooms. The house was built between 1936 and 1937, with a guest house added in 1939. Its daring cantilevers began to sag almost at once, and a restoration from 2001 to 2003 strengthened them with post-tensioned steel.
In 1963 Edgar Kaufmann Jr. gave the house to the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, and it has been open to visitors since 1964. In 2019 it became part of the UNESCO World Heritage listing for Wright's 20th-century architecture.
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