Price Tower Former Owner Sues Media for Defamation

Cynthia Blanchard, the former owner of Price Tower in Bartlesville, Oklahoma, and the Dallas-based firm 20cDesign have initiated a defamation lawsuit against several media organizations. The suit, filed on May 5 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, also targets the Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy and its executive director, Barbara Gordon. The legal action stems from media coverage surrounding the 2024 sale of specific furnishings from the tower.

The lawsuit alleges that publications including Dwell, Artnet, and Smithsonian Magazine falsely characterized these transactions as unlawful. The core of the dispute, as reported by Urgent Matter, centers on a preservation easement linked to the nineteen-story building. Completed in 1956 and situated forty-five miles north of Tulsa, Price Tower is Frank Lloyd Wright’s only skyscraper. The conservancy asserts that the easement covers the building’s interior furnishings. However, Blanchard and 20cDesign contend in their complaint that permission from the conservancy was not necessary for selling the eleven original furnishings, yet media outlets still reported the sale as illegal.

Among the items sold were a directory board, architectural copper relief panels, and copper tables, all designed by Wright. The conservancy filed a claim against Price Tower’s owners in August 2024 after discovering the removal of these fittings. Copper Tree Group, operated by Blanchard, acquired the tower in 2023 and maintains it never signed the easement.

The lawsuit identifies specific defamatory language, citing Artnet’s report that 20cDesign obtained the items “in a sale that breached the conservancy’s preservation easement.” It also references Smithsonian Magazine’s assertion that the furnishings “had been protected under a preservation easement but had been sold anyway, without the organization’s permission.” Prior to filing the suit, Blanchard sent a cease-and-desist letter to the Gannett-owned newspaper Bartlesville Examiner-Enterprise, which had extensively covered the story. In a January 2025 letter, Thomas Curley, Gannett’s associate general counsel, responded to Blanchard, stating that “no one has a right to insist upon only news coverage with which she may agree.”

Source: Artforum