A Sacred Island in the City of the Automobile R.M. Schindler, Architect by Pierluigi Serraino Much is known about the work of Austrian master Rudolph Mark Schindler (1887-1953). It is certainly one of the first names architects and lovers of modern architecture quickly learn in their initial exposure to modernity and Los Angeles. His signature is distinctive, his design attitude cultivated, and his...
The Post World War II American suburb and the Museum of Modern Art, New York The decade following World War II witnessed an explosion of new housing in the United States. The American suburb was being reimagined and extensively built for the commuter family. Mass-produced and prefabricated model homes, such as those by Levitt & Sons and the Lustron Company also became popular as viable and affordable...
A New Vision for Pierre Koenig's West Coastal Design The Henbest-Birkett Residence, 1966-2011 by Andrea Dietz The roads that wind through the higher elevations of Rancho There, through a door-slip that upholds the illusion of an Palos Verdes are made for Sunday driving. It’s possible, even, that Sunday driving was made for them. Wide and lazy, they meander up slopes and along ridgelines,...
Adaptation and Perseverence The Bolton/Culbertson House by Mimi Zeiger The Bolton/Culbertson House in Pasadena wears its more than 100-year history well. Located on West Del Mar Boulevard, just off Millionaires Row, the stately Craftsman bungalow seems to defy time. A herringbone brick path cuts through a trim lawn to a welcoming porch. A wide cedar door, detailed with teak insets and a stained glass...
by Barbara Lamprecht Photos (2014) by Cameron Carothers It is rare to find a house designed by Richard Neutra (1892 – 1970) in absolutely original condition. Still rarer to find it beautifully maintained. Rarest of all to learn that it is a member of Neutra’s fabled “Silverlake Colony.” And while his ubiquitous use of silver paint on trim is well known, beyond rare is the existence of a silver...
by Frank Escher Photos by Cameron Carothers In a booklet that client Kenneth Reiner and architect John Lautner published for tours conducted at an un-finished Silvertop in early 1960 (to raise funds for another collaboration of theirs, the Midtown School), one finds, among pages describing in great detail the many technical and structural innovations the visitors would encounter, this statement: a...
by Marc Atlan In 2008, I had the idea to search for a parcel of land in the high desert near the town of Joshua Tree, California, on which I could create a completely unique and radical hideaway. The contrast between the unspoiled, almost prehistoric landscape of the area and an avant-garde 21st century structure appealed to me. During my hunt for an appropriate plot, I met a real estate agent who...
by Jocelyn Gibbs Many houses evoke personal memories for current or former inhabitants. Some great houses, if they are recognized and preserved, become part of our collective memory for cultural and historical reasons. The William Ford house in Ojai, California, designed by Paul Revere Williams in 1929, is remarkable for its client, for its excellent design by a historically important architect, and for...
by Nicholas Olsberg American architects in the first years of the Twentieth Century were in desperate search for an end to what Joy Wheeler Dow called “the reign of terror” wrought by the grandiose, over-wrought and bombastic taste in building of the Gilded Age, with its deference to the chateaux and palaces of Europe. Calling, like many others, for an “American Renaissance’ that could uncover a...
The John A. Smith House La Habra Heights, California by Jocelyn Gibbs Cliff May (1908-1989), the designer and builder famous for popularizing the California ranch house, insisted that he “built just one kind of house, had just one style.” The persistence of his vision of what a house should be and how people should live, came from his pride in his family’s California heritage —he was related...
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